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BEVERLEY EDUCATIONAL SERIES 



EDITED BY 
W. W. CHARTERS 

PROFESSOR OF EDUCATION 

CARNEGIE INSTITUTE 

OF TECHNOLOGY 



THE 



PRINCIPLES OF EDUCATION 



BY 



JESSE H. COURSAULT, Ph.D. 

PROFESSOR OF THE HISTORY AND PHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION 
AND DEAN OF THE FACULTY OF THE SCHOOL OF EDU- 
CATION IN THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI 




SILVER, BURDETT AND COMPANY 

BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO SAN FRANCISCO 






Copyright, 1920, bt 
JESSE H. COURSAULT 

All rights reserved 



16 1920 



©CI.A601283 



; 



6^7 



EDITOR'S PREFACE / X^ 

During the later decades of the nineteenth century phi- 
losophy and psychology dominated the theory of educa- 
tion. From the principles of these two fields methods 
were deduced for which the claim was made that they 
produced the best results in instructional practice. 

During the twentieth century, however, experimental 
science has been the dominant method. Without regard 
for the philosophical point of view, specific methods 
of teaching, of supervision, and of administration have 
been studied in localized situations to discover the better 
oractice. During these two latter decades a very con- 
siderable body of technique has been collected and to this 
onstant accretions are being made. The force of the 
scientific impulse is, fortunately, not yet expended and 
it is confidently expected to continue indefinitely with 
increasing value. 

But since the tendency of science is to produce a body 
of technique, particle by particle, as investigators study 
small individual and relatively isolated problems, cen- 
tral attitudes and principles are temporarily ignored. 
The result of this is that the orientation of the whole 
mass of technique is lost sight of and those who practice 
do so without clear ultimate purposes in mind. 

With some subjects, such as the physical sciences, 
this tendency takes care of itself but in those sciences 
which treat of mind and men, so many uncontrolled 
factors enter into the direction and execution of practice 
that some guiding objectives are necessary in the pres- 
ent incomplete condition of knowledge and, in all prob- 



vi Editor's Preface 

ability, will always be necessary no matter how far the 
scientific development of the field may be carried. 

Moreover, the scientific attitude toward education 
which has substituted facts for opinions so satisfactorily 
in many cases, produces in the mind of the scientist 
and his followers a disesteem for philosophy. A fact is a 
fact, but a philosophical principle is an opinion and as 
such is treated as being neither trustworthy nor neces- 
sary. Consequently there is a distinct tendency among 
the less thoughtful educators at the present time to ig- 
nore principles of education. 

If, however, we look upon philosophy as an activity 
of the human mind which seeks to take stock of what 
has been accomplished and to determine its meaning, 
to disentangle the important from the unimportant, 
and to set all the items in some perspective, it is evident 
that it has a very definite place in education. 

Into such a conflict between a mental science with 
uncontrolled factors and scientific laboratory investi- 
gation wherein scant patience is frequently shown toward 
those who pause to get a perspective in the presence of a 
great body of unorganized facts, the appearance of this 
book, which deals with the principles of education, is 
timely. The author has accepted a point of view which 
he believes, and which to the editor appears to be, a 
useful interpretation of the tendencies of educational 
thought and effort in this generation, and has endeavored 
to organize the isolated facts and practices into an or- 
ganic unit. It will not only help the college student to 
orient himself in the midst of the complexities of such an 
unorganized field but will also provide the investigator 
and college teacher with, at least, a point of departure 
in his thinking. 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE 

This book is the outgrowth of twelve years of class- 
room instruction, supplemented by other work in the train- 
ing of teachers. It is an attempt to present with logical 
cogency a simple and definite system of principles for 
guiding educational thought and practice. Elaboration 
useless for this practical purpose has been avoided. 

Attention should be called especially to two character- 
istics of this discussion of the principles of education. 
(1) Man is here regarded as a person who seeks to attain 
purposes through means of control and also as a psycho- 
physical organism in a process of adjustment to environ- 
ment through stimuli and responses; but these two 
points of view, the confusion of which has led to much 
erratic thinking in the field of education, have been kept 
distinct. (2) The importance in the educative process 
of the appreciation of values is here emphasized as much 
as is the importance of the knowledge of facts, by which 
appreciated values may be attained. In this connection, 
the essential nature and function of history and of liter- 
ature and the other fine arts are explained, and the methods 
in accordance with which this subject matter should be 
taught are definitely presented. 

Quotations used in this book are evidence of my in- 
debtedness to various authors. I should acknowledge 
especial indebtedness to my former- teachers, including 
Professors Paul H. Hanus, Hugo Miinsterberg, and 
Josiah Royce at Harvard University; Professors John 

vii 



vifT Author's Preface 

Dewey, John Angus MacVannel, Frank M. McMurry, 
and Edward L. Thorndike at Teachers College, Columbia 
University; and Professor John P. Gordy at Ohio State 
University. My former colleague Professor W. W. Char- 
ters of the Carnegie Institute of Technology has read the 
entire manuscript and has made valuable suggestions for 
its improvement. Dean Frank Thilly of Cornell Uni- 
versity and my colleagues Professors Max F. Meyer and 
George H. Sabine have given helpful criticisms of parts 
of the discussion. I am indebted to my colleagues Pro- 
fessors Frederick M. Tisdel and Robert M. Dewey, who 
have read the manuscript and are responsible for much 
improvement in the matter of expression. Acknowledg- 
ment is due my former colleague Dean Frank P. Graves 
of the University of Pennsylvania and his wife, Helen 
Wadsworth Graves, who have reviewed the proof of the 
entire book. Acknowledgment for helpful criticism of 
the manuscript and proof is due my wife, Edith Logan 
Coursault. A final indebtedness I owe to my parents, who 
encouraged me to prepare for the profession of teaching. 

Jesse H. Coursault. 

Columbia, Missouri, 
July, 1920. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. The Purpose and Plan of this Book . . . 1 

'il. The Larger Factors in Human Development 25 



THE INDIVIDUAL PROCESS 

III. Analysis of the Individual Process ... 51 

IV. How New Purposes Are Made .... 69 
V. How New Means of Control Are Made . . 100 

VI. Personal Development 129 

THE SOCIAL PROCESS 

VII. Analysis of the Social Process . . . .161 
VIII. The Nature of Patterns for Purposes — History 

and the Fine Arts 198 

IX. The Nature of Patterns for Control — The 

Sciences 243 

X. Social Development . . . . . ... 279 

THE EDUCATIONAL PROCESS 

XI. Analysis of the Educational Process . . .317 
XII. The Principles Underlying the Making of the 

Curriculum 350 

XIII. The Principles Underlying the Methods of 

Teaching . . . . . - . . .388 

XIV. Educational Development . . ..■ . 446 

Bibliography ... . . . . , , . .461 

Index ,„'.'•. 465 

ix 



SUGGESTIONS FOR USING THIS BOOK AS 
A TEXTBOOK 

This book is adaptable to students in various stages of 
advancement. The student unacquainted with psy- 
chology may omit the sections in which the principles of 
education are discussed from the point of view of natural 
science and still find a complete connected account of 
these principles presented from the point of view to 
which he has been accustomed in everyday life. Other 
omissions that may be made in the case of students whose 
knowledge of education is very limited will be evident to 
the teacher. 

The introductory chapter, which explains the purpose 
and plan of' this book, is necessarily more abstract than 
are the subsequent chapters. As shown on pages 21 and 
22, the systematic presentation of the principles of edu- 
cation -begins with Chapter II. The student whose pre- 
vious experience has not prepared him to understand 
fully the introductory chapter should, therefore, study 
it at first not for complete mastery, but for whatever 
insight into the purpose and plan of the subsequent dis- 
cussion he can gain by the careful reading of it. After 
he has studied the rest of the book, he will be prepared 
to understand fully this chapter and should then re-read it. 

Each chapter and section is prefaced by a brief state- 
ment of the essential ideas contained in it. At first the 
student should regard these statements tentatively as 
propositions to be explained and verified. After he has 



Using this Book as a Textbook xi 

read the discussion, he may regard them as the conclusions 
of the chapters or of the sections to which they belong. 

A few references for further study l with comment upon 
each and a few problems for solution are given at the end 
of each chapter. The student himself should find other 
readings and problems; for when he has acquired the 
subject matter here presented, he should be able to rec- 
ognize important discussions of principles of education as 
well as to review these discussions critically, and to recog- 
nize important educational problems as well as to apply 
the principles in solving them. Since one learns by doing, 
the importance of applying the principles in the criticism 
of educational thought and practice and in the solution 
of educational problems cannot be overestimated. Fur- 
thermore, the only adequate evidence that the student 
understands these principles is his ability to use them. 

In order to be most useful to the student, the principles 
of education must be logically organized in his experience. 
For this reason the subject matter is here presented in 
logical form. It is desirable, however, that the teacher 
in using this book as a textbook do not follow too closely 
the logical order of topics. It would be well, for example, 
in teaching the chapter entitled How New Purposes Are 
Made, 2 to show briefly the application of the conclusions 
reached to the explanation of the nature of some poem or 
picture, such as the Twenty-Third Psalm or The Slave 
Ship, 3 and to the explanation of the method of teaching 
this poem or picture. 4 The principles developed in the 
chapter entitled How New Means of Control Are Made* 

1 For class work, it is desirable that one copy of each important refer- 
ence book be reserved in the library for each four students in the class. 

2 Ch. IV. 4 See pp. 397-400, 402^04, and 404-406. 

3 See pp. 219-221 and 230-231. 5 ch. V. 



xii Using this Book as a Textbook 

could likewise be connected with some of the important 
facts given in the discussion of the general nature of the 
sciences/ and in the discussion of the method of teaching 
control subject matter. 2 Such cross references would 
add to the practical interest of the student in the study 
of the principles and would help him to carry over the 
earlier formulations of principles to their applications 
when later he takes up systematically the study of these 
applications. 

1 Ch. IX. 2 See pp. 416-427. 



THE PRINCIPLES OF EDUCATION 

CHAPTER I 
THE PURPOSE AND PLAN OF THIS BOOK 

In educational thought and practice, there is need of guiding 
principles which conform to the truths established by modern 
science and philosophy. It is the purpose of this book to make 
these principles simple, definite, and clear. The truths established 
by science and philosophy are revealed from two points of view, — 
that of natural science, which describes and explains man in the 
light of physical causation as an organism responding to stimuli 
from the environment ; and that of teleology, which regards him 
in the light of final causation as a person controlled by pur- 
poses and ideas. The principles of education derived from 
these two points of view may be made more easily available 
by reducing them to a single system through the translation 
of those derived from the point of view of natural science, 
which is more accurate, into the terms of teleology, which is 
easier. The method adopted here for presenting the principles 
of education is to analyze into its factors the process of human 
development which education is to control, and to find footy 
these factors unite in doing their work. 



Every student of education should critically revise, in the light 
of modern science and philosophy, the principles which guide his 
judgments of educational thought and practice. 

The purpose of this book is to make simple, definite, 
and clear, a body of principles which should guide in 
educational thought and practice. Every student of 

1 



2 The Principles of Education 

education has certain fundamental beliefs, or principles, 
which he uses as standards in judging the truth or falsity 
of educational ideas and practices, upon which, as an 
explanatory basis, he organizes his knowledge of educa- 
tional matters, and in the light of which he sees new 
difficulties to be overcome and new problems to be solved. 
He may not be able to state these principles in systematic 
form; indeed, he may not even recognize them as prin- 
ciples. But he has them nevertheless. He must have 
them in order to know what else in education is worth 
while. To call them to mind, he need only consider such 
questions as whether the state should establish separate 
agricultural or trades schools ; whether state aid to schools 
in poorer localities is just to taxpayers in wealthier 
localities; whether Latin, industrial arts, or some other 
subject matter should be included in the common school 
curriculum; what subjects in the curriculum should be 
elective and what subjects should be required; how 
science, history, or literature should be taught ; to what 
extent " telling " should enter into teaching ; what the 
values of interest and effort in school work are ; whether 
there should be a difference between preparation for 
college and preparation for life. To deal intelligently 
with these educational problems, to deal intelligently with 
any educational problems, even where scientific measure- 
ment is made use of, one must have some fundamental 
ideas as to the nature of education and the part which 
education plays in the drama of life. 

The ordinary source of these principles is a more or 
less faulty popular tradition. Many of them have grown 
up in the popular mind and have become embalmed in 
the common expressions of the language. From time to 
time they have appeared as new ideas, but with the pass- 



The Purpose and Plan of this Book 3 

ing of generations they became common habits of thought 
and now appear with the cloak of authority as "common 
sense." Just as people speak of the sun's "rising" 
and "setting" as if by its own motion, although for 
three hundred years science has taught differently, so 
they entertain with regard to the fundamentals of edu- 
cation many ideas that are antiquated and untrue. In- 
deed, even persons who have made some progress in the 
study of education are often handicapped by the in- 
adequate popular ideas to which they have been accus- 
tomed since childhood and which are as much a part of 
their mental equipment as the language they speak. 
Among these popular fallacies, some of which are in 
conflict one with another, are the beliefs that our ideas 
of things in the external world are copies of the things 
themselves; that these copies are impressed upon the 
mind through the senses; that the mind is composed of 
general powers, or faculties, which can be developed by 
special exercise ; that the chief aim of education is knowl- 
edge ; that the most valuable effect of literature and music 
is refined pleasure; that the child's undirected interests 
are the only guides to what he should study; that the 
most valuable result of education is mental discipline 
and strength gained through effort in learning. 

Because the principles of education are of such funda- 
mental importance, and because the popular " common 
sense " beliefs are so often untrue, every student of 
education should revise critically his basic ideas of the 
subject and make them conform to the truths established 
by modern science and philosophy. Failure to do this 
abandons him to the fallacies of popular judgment in 
educational matters; it leaves him with an inadequate 
basis for explaining and organizing modern educational 



4 The Principles of Education 

truths, and consequently without easily available guides 
for educational practice ; and it consigns him to the futile 
task of trying to solve false problems which arise in any 
attempt to carry out principles that are not true. Illus- 
trations will make this statement plainer. The erroneous 
popular belief that literature is merely for refined pleasure 
would lead one to misjudge the importance of this sub- 
ject in the course of study. The belief that ideas of 
things in the external world are copies of those things 
acquired through the senses would be an inadequate 
basis for explaining, and therefore an inadequate basis for 
organizing for use, the steps by which a person acquires 
knowledge through solving problems by means of hy- 
potheses. The erroneous popular belief that the most 
valuable result of education is mental discipline and 
strength gained through effort in learning, and the con- 
flicting, but equally erroneous, belief that the child's 
undirected interests are the only guides to what he should 
study, -would lead respectively to the one-sided problems 
of what should be in the curriculum merely because it 
requires effort and furnishes discipline, and what should 
be in merely because it excites interest. 

Special studies in the field of education, such as educa- 
tional psychology, the theory of teaching, and school 
administration, as well as more general subject matter, 
such as ethics, sociology, biology, general psychology, 
history, logic, epistemology, and metaphysics, reveal 
valid principles of education. None of them, however, 
covers the whole field of education. Each reveals prin- 
ciples of education from a special angle. All are more 
or less isolated and lack that organization which includes 
all points of view, which comprehends all of the funda- 
mental principles, and which closely unites them into a 



The Purpose and Plan of this Book 5 

logical system. To learn the fundamental truths of 
education through a direct, comprehensive, systematic 
study of them and thereby to satisfy a serious need for 
which other subject matter does not provide, — this is 
the essential reason for the study of the principles of 
education. 

II 

Since human development is explained in terms of both efficient 
and final causation, a simple basis for organizing the principles of 
education is possible only when the principles of education revealed 
from these two points of view are reduced to a common denomina- 
tor. 

In seeking a simple basis on which to organize the 
principles of education for systematic study; we meet a 
difficulty in the fact that a human being may be regarded 
in two very different ways, and that various special 
studies of human life, whatever the minor differences 
among them may be, take one or the other of these general 
points of view. Since man has a body and is, therefore, 
a part of the physical world, such natural sciences as 
biology undertake to describe and explain his nature and 
behavior in a materialistic way as controlled by physical 
causes only; since he has a spirit and is, therefore, a 
free moral personality, teleological studies, such as logic, 
ethics, and history, regard him as controlled by purposes 
and ideas. A simple basis on which to organize the 
principles of education apparent from these two widely 
different points of view, which we shall explain more 
fully, is possible only if the principles can be reduced to a 
common denominator. In order to find this common 
denominator, this simple basis for bringing together and 
organizing educational principles, it will be necessary 
first to consider more fully the point of view of natural 



6 The Principles of Education 

science, which may be called physical, or materialistic, 
and the point of view of teleology, which may be called 
ethical, or idealistic. 

Ill 

Natural science describes and explains man as a psychophysical 
organism controlled by physical causation only, and accounts for 
purposes and ideas as mere accompaniments of changes in the 
brain, thus making the body appear to be master of the mind. 

Natural science, since it is the science of the physical 
world, must base its explanations upon physical causes. 
This method of explanation is the only one that it ever 
uses, the only one that it knows anything about. Primi- 
tive man, with his superstitious belief in animism, attempted 
to explain changes in the physical world by attributing 
them to spiritual forces ; the modern scientist — never ! 
Imagine the futility of trying to convince a physicist that, 
when the throttle is open, the steam locomotive moves 
as the result of some spirit inherent in the mechanism! 
The physical structure of the locomotive and the physical 
conditions under which it is placed are sufficient for a 
complete explanation. These, in turn, are traced to their 
physical causes. The locomotive was produced by whir- 
ring machinery in the factory, and the machinery was 
the product of previous mechanical action. One condi- 
tion for the movement of the engine is coal, which was 
made by physical forces geological ages ago. Indeed, 
every factor in the movement of the locomotive may be 
traced backward, theoretically at least, from physical 
effect to physical cause, until the chain of connection is 
lost in primeval chaos. Nowhere, absolutely nowhere, 
does natural science recognize a spirit link in this chain. 

But did not men work in making the locomotive? 
Did they not with physical hands guide the iron and steel 



The Purpose and Plan of this Book 7 

through the machines and swing the hammers in assem- 
bling the parts? And did they not do this because they 
had desires to earn wages and to construct, and had ideas 
that guided their movements ? According to the view of 
natural science, they did not do this because they had 
desires and ideas. Natural science cannot recognize 
feelings and ideas as having any part whatever in the 
causal chain. Conservation of energy, a fundamental 
assumption of science, forbids it, because force can be 
attributed with scientific accuracy to physical objects 
only. According to this assumption, the total amount 
of force in the universe is always the same; it never 
increases or diminishes. If this assumption is true, 
energy, when not manifesting itself, must be considered as 
latent,. or stored away. For example, when a clock spring 
is wound, energy is stored in it to be given off gradually 
in the running of the clock during the flight of hours. 
When a wagon is drawn up hill, the force applied to it 
that is not turned into heat by the friction of the running 
parts, is stored up in it and is given out again when the 
wagon runs down hill. Energy from the sun is stored in 
the coal and may be released to warm our houses, cook 
our food, or run our factories. But how could energy 
be stored in a mere idea or feeling, neither of which has a 
body or, except during its momentary appearance in con- 
sciousness, even exists? When the workman is asleep, 
when on a holiday he is thinking about social pleasures, 
the ideas and feelings that appear in the factory are not 
in his consciousness; they do not exist. How, then, 
could there be stored in them forces which contribute to 
the construction of the locomotive? How could there 
be stored in them the force necessary even to modify the 
engineer's brain and nerves so as to make his muscles 



8 The Principles of Education 

open the throttle, when the locomotive, under a full 
head of steam, is ready to run? According to natural 
science, so long as it holds to the fundamental assumption 
of the conservation of energy, purposes and ideas cannot 
have even an infinitesimal amount of force ; they cannot 
add to or in any way change physical forces. 

It is true that feelings and ideas may with correctness 
be spoken of as causes of physical actions. We may say 
that a man eats because he feels hungry or because he has 
the idea of strengthening his body. But in this case the 
materialistic point of view is not taken, and physical, or 
efficient, cause is not meant. What is meant is explained 
in the discussion of the teleological view of man. So far 
as natural science is concerned, to speak of feelings and 
ideas as causes of physical action is to use a metaphor that 
has no foundation in fact. The idea of the locomotive and 
the warmth of constructive interest, according to the ex- 
planation of natural science, can no more cause move- 
ments of the physical body of the workman than a bright 
idea can reflect sunshine into the factory, sharp wit cut 
the tempered steel, or the heat of desire kindle the forge. 

Since man's body is a part of the physical world, natural 
science has a right to explain his actions in its own way as 
the result of physical causes. Just as the movements of 
the locomotive are considered the result of its structure 
and of the physical environment, such as coal, air, and 
water, acting upon it, so the actions of man, whether they 
be breathing, walking, painting a picture, or composing 
a poem, may be explained as the result of his bodily struc- 
ture and of the stimuli coming from its physical environ- 
ment. And just as the structure of the locomotive is the 
result of physical causes, so the structure of the human 
being is the result of physical heredity, variation, and 



The Purpose and Plan of this Book 9 

natural selection in the great factory of the material 
world. 

Natural science, equipped with its materialistic methods 
of description and explanation, did not stop with the 
conquest of the physical world. Flushed with victory 
in this conquest, it invaded the realm of mind and at- 
tempted to explain the nature of consciousness. But 
here, at the very outset, it met a serious difficulty, because 
natural science was developed to explain the physical 
world and knows of no basis for explanation except physi- 
cal causation. Since, as has been shown, physical energy 
cannot be stored in ideas and feelings, the mind is not 
subject to the kind of causal relations to which natural 
science is limited in its explanations. A way to overcome 
this difficulty, however, was invented. It was known 
that lesions in the brain are accompanied by changes in 
the character of consciousness, that certain drugs taken 
into the body affect the ideas and feelings, that stimuli 
applied to nerves leading to the brain are followed by 
corresponding sensations. These and many other similar 
facts were made the basis for the assumption that every 
mental change is paralleled by a corresponding physical 
change in the brain. This assumption, which is called 
psychophysical parallelism, opened the way for natural 
science in the explanation and control of mental life. If 
every idea and feeling is chained in some mysterious way 
to a physical partner in the brain, natural science, although 
it cannot lay hands directly upon ideas and feelings, can 
do what is for practical purposes the same thing ; it can 
substitute for the direct explanation of ideas and feelings 
an explanation of the physical partners which they in- 
variably accompany. It can account for the sensation of 
light as the accompaniment of the stimulation of certain 



10 The Principles of Education 

brain cells, through the medium of the optic nerve, and 
for the variation in the intensity of the sensation as the 
accompaniment of the variation in the intensity of the 
stimulation ; it can account for the consciousness of a 
purpose as the accompaniment of a check in some habitual 
reaction to stimuli. We can find here an analogy between 
the way of controlling the feelings and ideas of a man and 
the way of controlling the music of a piano. The music 
itself is intangible, but accompanies the vibrations of the 
strings, which can be controlled by means of the physical 
keys. So with the intangible ideas and feelings of a man ; 
they accompany the brain processes which can be con- 
trolled by means of the physical sense organs. 

Although a natural science must logically explain 
mental changes indirectly through explaining physical 
changes in the brain, these physical changes need not be 
known directly through microscopic or other examina- 
tion. It may be assumed that the changes which cannot 
be observed are like those which, in the physical world, 
take place on so large a scale that they can be observed. 
Natural science often makes use of such analogies where 
direct observation fails. Nobody, for instance, ever saw 
an atom or a molecule, but explanations of chemistry are, 
with scientific accuracy, based upon the actions of these 
analogical constructs. Nobody ever saw ether, but this 
does not in the least interfere with the value of the physi- 
cist's explanation of the transmission of light. Other 
kinds of waves have been seen, and the ether waves may 
be imagined to be like these. So 'in the explanation of 
the physical counterparts of mental facts, the natural 
scientist may assume that the changes, where he cannot 
see them, resemble those which he has seen elsewhere in 
the physical world; and thus, if his assumptions are 



The Purpose and Plan of this Book 11 

consistent with the facts so far as the facts are known, 
he may rest assured that in making these assumptions 
he has not compromised the dignity of natural science. 

When the ideas and feelings of the mental world are 
accounted for materialistically as the associates, or 
parallels, of changes in the physical brain, sensations are 
explained as the accompaniments of brain changes started 
by physical action upon the in-going nerves; original 
desires are viewed as the accompaniments of checks in 
the expressions of instincts, or inborn nervous connec- 
tions, created through a long process of interaction between 
organisms and environment, and conserved by heredity ; 
and acquired desires are similarly explained as the ac- 
companiments of checks in the functioning of nervous 
connections made, according to the laws of habit forma- 
tion, in the lifetime of the organism. So, too, a vivid 
memory of an experience is accounted for as going hand 
in hand with a deep impression upon the brain; the 
association of ideas is regarded as the parallel of a path in 
the brain ; and the emotions are explained as due to bodily 
conditions affecting the brain through the nervous system. 
The meanings of ideas are likewise said to be the parallels 
of brain changes produced by reaction in the adjustment 
of the physical body to its environment ; growth of mental 
life is considered the accompaniment of changes in the 
brain resulting from continued interaction of organism 
and environment through stimuli and responses ; and the 
fact that one can learn more easily in youth than in old 
age is attributed to the plasticity of the brain during 
youth. Thus is natural law made to rule in the spiritual 
world, to the end that man may get scientific control of 
his thoughts and feelings, and in this way control the 
behavior which they indicate. 



12 The Principles of Education 



IV 

Teleologically man is regarded as a person controlled by pur- 
poses and ideas, the mind thus appearing to be master of the body. 
Purposes and ideas are directly interconnected through final causa- 
tion by bonds of meaning. 

When man is regarded as an essentially spiritual being, 
his conduct is no longer the result of blind force exerted 
through physical interaction which modifies the brain, 
but is rather the result of purposes which he has in mind 
and ideas which guide him in carrying out these purposes. 
In order to explain his action, we seek to find what he is 
trying to do and how he is trying to do it. We acknowl- 
edge him to be a person having inner experiences, and seek 
to understand his actions by reproducing in our imagina- 
tion his feelings and thoughts, his purposes and ideas. 
The physical body is not regarded as the basis for describ- 
ing and explaining his thoughts and feelings, but as an 
instrument under the control of his mind and used by his 
mind to accomplish its purposes. Instead of being master 
of the spiritual life, the body now becomes its servant. 

Here, from this point of view, to be sure, purposes and 
ideas are considered the causes of action. A man's pur- 
pose to write a letter is the cause for his walking to the 
typewriter ; his idea that oil makes a machine run more 
easily is the cause for his putting oil on the bearings. 
These causes are not, however, the kind recognized by 
natural science. In the case of natural science, the cause, 
which is physical, is a real thing preceding an effect. A 
billiard ball, for instance, must move before by impact it 
can move another ball. This kind of cause is called 
efficient. In the case of teleological explanations, where 
purposes and ideas are said to be the causes, the cause is 



The Purpose and Plan of this Book 13 

not a real thing until the effect is complete, until the end 
of the action. For this reason it is called a final cause. 
A man, for example, is running towards a moving car. 
What makes him run is the purpose of getting a seat in 
the car and the idea that he can do this by running, but 
he does not get the seat until the running is ended. In 
accounting from the teleological point of view for the 
appearance of purposes and ideas, no reference whatever 
to their physical counterparts in the brain is needed; 
they are interconnected and controlled by meanings 
which we can directly experience when they appear in 
our consciousness. This is the common way of regarding 
persons in our daily relations with them. With no thought 
of brain changes, we can reproduce in our imagination 
and thereby directly understand and appreciate the man's 
purpose of getting a seat in the moving car, and we can 
understand in connection with this purpose the meaning 
of the man's running. 

V 

In order to take advantage of the stronger features of both ma- 
terialistic and teleological points of view, in reducing the principles 
of education to a single basis for organization, principles derived 
from natural science, which within certain limitations is more ac- 
curate and authoritative, should be translated into the more familiar 
and more easily understood terms of teleology. 

The two general ways in which human life is viewed 
have now been set forth. One uses as the basis for its 
explanations blind force transmitted through physical 
interaction, or, in other words, efficient causation ; the 
other uses as the basis for its explanations purposes to be 
attained, or, in other words, final causation. The vistas 
of causation revealed from these two general points of 



14 The Principles of Education 

view lie in opposite directions. The one looks towards 
the past, retracing the chain of physical cause and effect 
until it is led ultimately to the forces emanating from 
primeval chaos; the other looks towards the future, 
accounting for each purpose by one farther ahead, until 
it is led ultimately in the explanation of things to that 
" one, far-off, divine event to which the whole creation 
moves." Our next problem is to find how these two gen- 
eral points of view may be related so that the principles 
of education • learned from the various special studies 
which represent them may be unified. 

Since only the realm of mind and the realm of matter 
are known, 1 the idealistic and the materialistic are the 
only points of view which studies of human life may take • 
there is no other point of view which includes the two and 
could bear the burden of reconciliation. The problem of 
reconciliation becomes, therefore, the problem of translating 
truths learned from one of these points of view into the 
terms of the other. In undertaking this task, the first 
question that arises is : Into which set of terms, the ma- 
terialistic or the teleological, should the translation be 
made and the educational principles collected for or- 
ganization ? 

In the statements of the principles of education, as 
an examination of textbooks in this subject reveals-, a 
decided preference has been shown for the language and 
technique of natural science. This preference has been 
shown because natural science speaks with accuracy and 
authority. It can speak thus, because the things with 
which it deals, stimuli and reactions through the medium 

1 For those interested in metaphysics, it may be said that this 
statement is not intended to imply metaphysical dualism, since 
mind and matter are mere abstractions from a unitary experience. 



The Purpose and Plan of this Book 15 

of the brain, are manifestations of physical things known 
in common by all observers, either directly or through 
analogy with other things which are known directly, 
and which can be analyzed, accurately measured, and 
reduced to a mathematical basis. Experimental psy- 
chology furnishes abundant illustrations of this. On the 
other hand, from the point of view of teleology, the rela- 
tions of thoughts and feelings can be determined only 
by the rule-of -thumb method of trying them in one's own 
mind, because they are connected by bonds of meaning,' 
which can be understood only by being felt, and because 
the price paid for individuality is that one can feel only 
the content of his own mind and can never become 
directly conscious of that which is in the mind of another. 
The public speaker, for example, tries his arguments 
upon himself to determine what effect they will have 
upon his audience ; the writer of advertisements imagines 
himself in the place of his readers and includes in the 
advertisement the ideas that would have the desired 
effect upon him ; the teacher sympathetically puts him- 
self in the place of his pupils, tries his lesson plan in 
imagination, and thus judges from what takes place in 
his mind what experience his pupils will have. Yet, 
although in general this method is practically valuable, 
as the successful efforts of orators, advertisers, and 
teachers who use it bear witness, the address may not 
lead to the convictions intended, the advertisement may 
not excite a desire for the articles offered for sale, and the 
ideas and feelings which the pupils do actually get may 
differ from the ones expected. Indeed, those who use 
this rule-of-thumb method may differ one from another 
in their conclusions. It is to overcome just such diffi- 
culties as these that natural science has been called upon 



16 The Principles of Education 

to adapt its accurate and authoritative methods to the 
realm of mind. In the psychological laboratory, mechani- 
cal descriptions and explanations, objective measurements 
and mathematical technique have begun to replace with 
scientifically tested truths the inaccurate and conflicting 
opinions which individuals have formed about mental 
phenomena by examining subjectively their own ex- 
perience. 

Compared with that of natural science, the teleological 
way of regarding people has the advantage of being easier 
to use. It is the common way of everyday life, used by 
children as well as by grown-ups, by the illiterate as well 
as by the most learned. But although a little child can 
know meaningful connections between thoughts and feel- 
ings, many a university student finds difficulty in under- 
standing the efficient causal connections paralleling these 
mental phenomena, when the mind is regarded from the 
point of view of natural science ; and although an igno- 
rant beggar may control the ideas and feelings of another 
person regarded teleologically so as to get food and cloth- 
ing, the most capable psychologists are still puzzled with 
regard to the materialistic explanation of this persuasion. 
Indeed, the contrast need not be so marked. How many 
teachers now in our schools would have been excluded 
from educational work if there were no simpler guide for 
teaching than the principles of biology and psychophysics ! 

Each point of view, therefore, is found to be strong 
where the other is weak. In order to take advantage of 
the strong features of each, it is necessary to translate the 
accurate and authoritative educational principles of 
natural science into the familiar language of the teleologi- 
cal view of life, so that these principles can be understood 
and used more easily. 



The Purpose and Plan of this Book 17 

But this is not all. The point of view of teleology has 
further claim to be the basis for the unification of the 
principles of education ; namely, that it is more compre- 
hensive and more fundamental than that of natural 
science. 

In the case of primitive man, the teleological view alone 
was taken. Tribes separated by mountain and ocean all 
believed in animism, which represents the actions of 
things as controlled by final rather than by efficient 
causation. When, after many centuries, natural science 
became triumphant in the physical world, it began a 
conquest of the mind; but, although it has made rapid 
progress and notable achievement in explaining the spirit- 
ual world according to natural law, this work has only 
begun, and where it has not advanced, we are still depend- 
ent for guidance upon the teleological view alone. For 
this reason, psychology, which first came to its conclusions 
through introspection and which has since substituted 
psychophysical for teleological explanations, has now 
taken on a hybrid character. In view of these facts, it 
is evident that, owing to the youth of the latter, idealism 
has a broader vision than natural science. 

But even when natural science has come into its own, 
it will not be able to catch all things in experience with 
its net of physical description and explanation. It was 
called into existence in the service of man's purposes 
understood and appreciated, not mechanically explained ; 
it will always remain in this service. The scientist never 
makes any investigation except when led to do so by some 
purpose. Science has no value and cannot even be 
defined without reference to the purpose which it serves. 
Its expression in book and lecture is addressed to man 
regarded teleologically. However mechanical human life 



18 The Principles of Education 

may be made to appear, the fact still remains that purpose 
teleologically felt, not mechanically explained, is the pillar 
of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night that leads 
natural science through the wilderness of investigation 
and gives value and meaning to its activities. 

In the most intimate and fundamental relations of 
life, moreover, our fathers and mothers, our brothers and 
sisters, our friends and our enemies are not looked upon, 
will never be looked upon, as mere psychophysical organ- 
isms, the products of heredity, variation, and natural 
selection, fated to a continuous adjustment to environ- 
ment through stimuli and responses. They are acknowl- 
edged, and always will be acknowledged, as persons who 
have feelings of ideal values, in the light of which they 
affirm and deny, choose and reject, like and dislike, love 
and hate. There is something more significant in the 
mother's love for her child and in the holy aspiration of 
the saint than can be revealed by accounting for these 
emotions as we account for squirming when one is tickled 
and gasping when one is hit in the stomach. This deeper 
significance is revealed only from the teleological point 
of view, through sympathetic understanding and apprecia- 
tion in terms of one's own experience. So long as a halo 
of worth is worn by love and duty, so long, indeed, as any 
value whatever remains in life, the language of natural 
science will never be the language in which man expresses 
his deepest convictions. It is not an accident that the 
great religions recognize a divine purpose in the universe ; 
it is not an accident that the great philosophies are 
idealistic. 



The Purpose and Plan of this Book 19 
VI 

The method here adopted for presenting the principles of educa- 
tion in a systematic form is to analyze into its factors the process 
of human development, which education is to control, and to find 
how these factors unite in doing their work, the teleological view 
being given first and then supported by natural science. 

Before undertaking to present the principles of educa- 
tion in terms of the language of teleology, one more 
problem must be solved. A plan of procedure, a method 
of organization, must be found which will present these 
principles in the most economical and effective way. 

Since ideas come into the mind when they are called 
for in the solution of problems, it is desirable to get a 
series of problems which will bring the principles of edu- 
cation to mind in a systematic way. The best series of 
problems is undoubtedly that which appears when one 
follows the steps ordinarily taken in the investigation of 
any complex thing. When a youth successfully investi- 
gates the nature of a mechanical toy, he takes the toy 
apart and puts it together again; to understand the 
constitution of the material world, the chemist has sepa- 
rated material objects into their chemical elements, and 
then has found and stated as laws the uniform ways in 
which these elements unite to make the objects; to 
understand the nature of language, the grammarian has 
analyzed language into the elementary parts of speech 
and then has discovered and stated as rules of grammar 
the uniform ways in which these parts of speech combine ; 
to understand our institutions, the historian seeks through 
historical analysis to find the purposes which gave rise to 
them and the way in which these purposes and the solu- 
tions of attendant problems have combined to make them 
what they are. Analysis and synthesis are the steps that 



20 The Principles of Education 

mark the problems through which one proceeds ordinarily 
in his investigations. 

Since education is an important factor in the process of 
human development, and since the principles of educa- 
tion are the principles which control this process, the 
best plan of procedure in getting the principles of educa- 
tion in a systematic form is to analyze the process of human 
development into its elementary factors and then to find 
how these factors unite in doing their work. 

In making this analysis, the larger factors, which are 
themselves complex processes, will naturally be distin- 
guished first ; and then, in turn, these will be analyzed into 
the simpler factors of which they are composed. It is to 
be expected, therefore, that the first ideas presented will 
of necessity be general in nature and not sharply defined 
in content; but, as the analysis proceeds and becomes 
more specific by reducing more complex processes into 
the simpler factors of which they are composed, these 
ideas will become more sharply defined in content and 
correspondingly more definite and clear. 

In order to avoid a confusion of the two points of view 
from which human development may be studied, the 
principles, in the case of each larger problem, will first 
be presented from the teleological point of view, and will 
then be supported by the conclusions of natural science. 

Because of the incompleteness of thoroughly-tested 
materialistic explanations of experience, an incomplete- 
ness due to the newness of this venture, materialistic 
explanations given in this book must often go beyond the 
bounds of verified fact and depend for authority upon 
analogical reasoning. When the narrow limits of verified 
facts have been reached, the only further evidence avail- 
able from the point of view of natural science must be 



The Purpose and Plan of this Book 21 

based upon certain similarities that have been proved 
to exist between the brain and other physical things of 
which we have a better understanding. Knowing, for 
instance, that in some fundamental particulars the brain 
is like a " telephonic switchboard " or " interrelated 
channels," we are well justified in assuming that probably 
this similarity extends to other particulars. Conclusions 
reached by analogical reasoning have, therefore, some 
authority ; and the use of them is justifiable in securing 
from the materialistic point of view evidence corrobora- 
tive of conclusions reached from the teleological point of 
view. They should be accepted, however, only tenta- 
tively, because scientific investigation at some future time 
may invalidate the arguments upon which such conclu- 
sions have been based. 

ORGANIZATION OF CHAPTERS 

The organization of the subsequent chapters of this book is 
graphically represented on page 22. Human development is analyzed 
into three processes, — the individual, the social, and the educational. 
The discussions of these three processes constitute the three main di- 
visions of this book. The individual process is analyzed into its 
factors, purposes and means of control, which combine in making 
personal development. The social process is analyzed into its 
factors, the patterns for purposes and the patterns for means of 
control, which combine in making social development. The edu- 
cational process, which unites the individual and the social processes, 
is analyzed into its factors, the making of the curriculum and the 
methods of teaching, which combine in making educational de- 
velopment. The Roman numerals indicate the respective chapters 
in which the several topics are discussed. 



22 



The Principles of Education 



II. The Larger Factors 

in Human Development 

(The individual, social, 

and educational processes) 



III. Analysis 

of the Individual 

Process 



VII. Analysis 

of the Social 

Process 



IV. How New 

Purposes Are 

Made 



V. How New 

Means of 

Control Are 

Made 



\ 



\ / 



/ 



VIII. The Na- 
ture of Patterns 
for Purposes — 
History and the 
Fine Arts 



\ 
\ 

IX. The Na- 
ture of Patterns 
for Control — 
The Sciences 



\ ./ 



VI. Personal 
Development 



X. Social 
Development 




XI. Analysis of the 
Educational Process 



XIII. The Principles 

Underlying the 
Methods of Teaching 



XII. The Principles 

Underlying the 

Making of the 

Curriculum 



XIV. Educational 
Development 



REFERENCES 

Bagley, W. C, The Educative Process, 1907, pp. 1-3. (Shows the 
value of the principles of education.) 



The Purpose and Plan of this Book 23 

Moore, E. C, What Is Education? 1915, pp. 1-15. (Discusses the 
importance of the study of the principles of education.) 

Munsterberg, H., Psychology and the Teacher, 1910, pp. 34-40. 
(Gives a simple statement of the teleological point of view.) 

Charters, W. W., Methods of Teaching, 1912, pp. 9-25. (An ex- 
ample of the teleological point of view in the discussion of the 
function of teaching.) 

McMurry, F. M., How to Study and Teaching How to Study, 1909, 
pp. 12-27. (An example of the teleological point of view in the 
discussion of the nature of study and of its principal factors.) 

Munsterberg, H., Psychology and the Teacher, 1910, pp. 99-127. 
(Explains briefly and clearly the point of view of natural science.) 

Bagley, W. C, The Educative Process, 1907, pp. 1-22. (An example 
of the point of view of natural science in the discussion of educa- 
tion reduced to its lowest terms.) 

Horne, H. H., The Philosophy of Education, 1905, pp. 18-56. (An 
example of the point of view of natural science in the discussion 
of the biological aspect of education.) 

Ruediger, W. C, The Principles of Education, 1910, pp. 20-36. (An 
example of the point of view of natural science in the discussion 
of the biological bases of education.) 

Pyle, W. H., The Outlines of Educational Psychology, 1911, pp. 13-20. 
(Gives a brief and simple statement of the relation between the 
mind and body from the point of view of psychology.) 

Angell, J. R., Chapters from Modern Psychology, 1912, pp. 45-71. 
(Discusses the relation between the mind and the body.) 

Angell, J. R., Psychology, 1908, pp. 13-58. (Describes the psycho- 
physical organism and the nervous system, upon which natural 
science bases its descriptions and explanations of human nature.) 

Munsterberg, H., Psychology and Life, 1899, pp. 1-34. (This 
reading, which is more difficult for immature students than 
those given above, shows that the point of view of natural science 
is not the fundamental one with regard to human nature.) 

PROBLEMS 

1. Answer the questions on page 2 and indicate in each case the 
general principle you have assumed in answering the question. (For 
example, if you say that Latin should not be taught in the common 



24 The Principles of Education 

schools because it is not practical, you assume as a principle that all 
subject matter taught in such schools should )ye practical.) 

2. a. Do you hold any belief specified on page 3 as erroneous? 
b. If so, how did you acquire this belief ? 

3. a. Make a list of five acts you do habitually and indicate in 
each case the stimulus and response, b. Indicate in each case the 
purpose of the act. c. Distinguish between the two points of view 
from which you have regarded yourself in this exercise. 

4. Select from the books noted above as references for class 
reading five statements that represent the materialistic point of view 
and five statements that represent the point of view of teleology. 

5. Show how a small amount of scientific experimentation proved 
authoritatively the fallacy in the doctrine of formal discipline as 
accepted for centuries by educational thinkers who did not use this 
method of investigation. 

6. From the point of view of natural science, does a man appear 
to be morally free in choosing what he will do ? 

7. "What is the best reason you can give for believing that, with 
reference to man, the point of view of teleology is more fundamental 
than the point of view of natural science ? 



CHAPTER II 
THE LARGER FACTORS IN HUMAN DEVELOPMENT 

The larger factors in human development are (1) the social 
factor, which determines the purposes and ideas available for 
controlling conduct ; (2) the individual factor, in which these 
purposes and ideas are realized; and (3) the educational factor, 
which unites the other two by providing conditions favorable 
to the development of social purposes and ideas in the individual 
life. 



The social and individual factors are revealed superficially 
through opposition between them. 

" Civilized man is born, lives, and dies in a state of 
slavery ; at his birth he is sewed up in swaddling clothes, 
and at his death he is nailed in a coffin ; so long as he pre- 
serves the human form, he is fettered by various institu- 
tions." This extreme statement by Rousseau, provoked by 
conditions preceding the French Revolution, calls attention 
to the individual and the social factors in human develop- 
ment by showing them in opposition to each other. 
Since the dramatic element of strife commands attention, 
the prevalent ideas of these factors have been developed 
largely out of opposition between them. The maxim 
" Spare the rod and spoil the child/ ' would make it appear 
that the individual should be whipped into lines of activity 
approved by society. The business man who violates the 
generally accepted ideas of fair dealing and the husband 
whose treatment of his family does not accord with his 

25 



26 The Principles of Education 

neighbors' standards of kindness, are made to feel the 
indignation of the community. Because not controlled 
by ideas commonly accepted, the polygamist is imprisoned 
and the murderer is put to death. Socrates, accused of 
denying the gods recognized by the state and of teaching 
the youth ideas which Athenians generally did not accept, 
was compelled to drink the fatal hemlock. Giordano 
Bruno asserted that the world moves, and a society with 
whose fundamental beliefs this idea conflicted burned 
him at the stake ; while, shortly afterwards, Galileo also 
would have been sacrificed on the altar of social regulation, 
had he not recanted a similar belief. John Huss suffered 
martyrdom for his religious ideas and Martin Luther 
probably escaped a similar fate by concealment in the 
castle of Wartburg. Truly did the three crosses on 
Calvary symbolize the fact that both the reformer and 
the criminal are transgressors of social beliefs and customs, 
and that, in exercising a regulative influence to enforce its 
own standards, society has made the way of the trans- 
gressor hard. 

II 

The social factor determines the purposes and ideas essential 
to the development of men ; this social regulation varies in different 
groups at the same time and in the same group at different times ; 
and the story of the changes of this social regulation is the history 
of civilization. 

In the contrast between the individual and society 
made apparent by such instances as those noted above, 
society seems to regulate in an arbitrary way the ideas 
and purposes of the individual; it seems artificially to 
impose man-made restrictions upon him. Rousseau ex- 
presses this idea very well in his " social contract " 
theory, which holds that men, having lived only as inde- 



The Larger Factors in Human Development 27 

pendent individuals, made a contract to live together as 
a society, because they saw that selfish advantages could 
thereby be gained. A ruler was then provided for and 
the machinery of state established to enforce the regula- 
tions of the contract upon those who would seek to evade 
them. 

By placing authority thus with the masses and by 
making the king and his officers appear to be merely 
agents of the masses in enforcing the social contract, 
Rousseau's theory exercised a strong influence in over- 
coming the belief in the divine right of kings. In this 
way it played a prominent part in opening the flood- 
gates of human passion so that outgrown and pernicious 
social regulations were swept away in the French Revolu- 
tion. But however valuable these results may have been, 
Rousseau's theory of the nature of the social factor in 
human development is superficial. 

Man, to translate the words of Aristotle, is a " social 
animal." Indeed, even lower animals, down to the bees 
and the ants, have forms of social organization, though 
they certainly know nothing about contracts and do not 
understand that advantages come from social organiza- 
tion. A human being becomes a member of society for 
the same reason that he breathes air and eats food, — it 
is his nature to do so. Development of the purposes and 
ideas which control his conduct is as much dependent 
upon life in society as his physical development is depend- 
ent upon air and food. Every worthy purpose and every 
valuable idea which the individual acquires is social in 
its origin and is acquired by him from society. Indeed, 
the idea of a contract, the ideas of advantages coming 
from social organization, although assumed by the " social 
contract " theory to antedate social relations, would 



28 The Principles of Education 

never have been known, had not man been living a social 
life for countless generations. As Professor Baldwin 
says : " Man is not a person who stands up in his isolated 
majesty, meanness, passion, or humility, and sees, hits, 
worships, fights, or overcomes, another man, who does 
the opposite things to him, each preserving his isolated 
majesty, meanness, passion, humility, all the while, so 
that he can be considered a ' unit ' for the compounding 
processes of social speculation. On the contrary, a man 
is a social outcome rather than a social unit. He is 
always, in his greatest part, also someone else. Social 
acts of his — that is, acts which may not prove anti-social 
— are his because they are society's first; otherwise he 
would not have learned them nor have had any tendency 
to do them. Everything that he learns is copied, repro- 
duced, assimilated, from his fellows; and what all of 
them, including him, — all the social fellows, — do and 
think, they do and think because they have each been 
through the same course of copying, reproducing, assimi- 
lating, that he has." * 

In the light of this explanation of man as a " social 
animal," it becomes evident that the headsman's axe 
and the hangman's noose, the prison and the whipping 
post, and popular disapproval and indignation, are inci- 
dental in social regulation. For the most part, since it 
is his nature to do so, the individual willingly acquires 
from society the purposes and ideas that control his 
action. He cannot get in any other way the purposes 
and ideas that are necessary to satisfy his own needs and 
to promote his own personal development. Only after 
thousands of generations of cooperative struggle has 

1 Baldwin, James Mark, Social and Ethical Interpretations, 1906, 
p. 96. 



The Larger Factors in Human Development 29 

society attained these purposes and ideas; they have 
been bought with the sweat and blood of centuries. But 
they are free to the individual for the taking. If he were 
denied the advantage of this vicarious struggle of society, 
his puny mind and short life span would make personal 
development impossible. Without this social inheritance 
he could never be a man. 

Different nations at the same time and the same nations 
at different times have varied greatly in their accumulated 
store of purposes and ideas available to individuals within 
the social group. In this respect, the Spartans differed 
from the Athenians, the Germans from the French, and 
the subjects of Queen Elizabeth from those of George V. 
Volumes have been filled with records of the important 
changes which the Roman invasion brought about in 
the purposes and ideas of western Europe, and within a 
half century Japanese purposes and ideas have been 
remade. 

The history of civilization is but the record of the 
changes in social regulation brought about by the develop- 
ment of new purposes and ideas which control men's 
conduct. In primitive times, human beings under social 
guidance found their highest satisfaction in the mere 
gaining of food, shelter, and protection against enemies, 
used the crudest of tools, saw spirit doubles in stones and 
trees, and regarded fire with superstitious awe. When 
the forces of nature were harnessed, and, with the use of 
fire, better tools were made, when habitations became 
settled and division of labor more complex, individuals 
were brought to the realization of higher, more complex 
purposes and ideas. In the Western World, the religious 
development of the Hebrews, the literary, artistic, and 
philosophical development of the Greeks, and the 



30 The Principles of Education 

institutional development of the Romans made further 
changes in the kind of regulation effected by society. 
Though men have come and men have gone, the char- 
acter of social regulation has continued to develop through 
the making of new purposes and ideas to the present age 
with its industrial factories and governmental institutions, 
its schools, libraries, art galleries, and churches. 



Ill 

The individual factor is the medium in which purposes and ideas 
are produced under social guidance, but individuals vary greatly 
in their abilities to profit by this guidance. 

What is the nature of the individual factor in human 
development? If, under conditions in which only the 
individual and the social factors are involved, we can in 
imagination take away the social, we have left the indi- 
vidual factor alone. For example, the human being 
known as Martin Luther may be imagined to have grown 
up in civilizations different from that in which he actually 
lived. If he had grown up among the Chinese, he would 
have eaten with chop sticks, and, having grown a cue, 
would have felt humiliation at the thought of losing it. 
Also, he would have thought in the Chinese language, 
understood only primitive methods of agriculture, if 
any, and would have entertained oriental religious ideas. 
In Athens at the time of Pericles, in Rome at the time of 
Caesar Augustus, in France at the time of the Crusades, 
he would have had different purposes and ideas, and 
therefore would have acted differently. That which 
would have been present in Luther under one civilization 
and not under another is obviously social in its nature, 
since it would have depended entirely upon the society 



The Larger Factors in Human Development 31 

in which he lived ; that which would have been present 
in him under any civilization is obviously individual in 
its nature, since it would not have depended upon the 
society in which he lived. Eliminating, then, the pur- 
poses and ideas which he might have acquired in any 
particular civilization, there is left a being capable of 
producing purposes and ideas in accordance with pat- 
terns set by society. The individual as thus distin- 
guished is the factor through which purposes and ideas 
are produced under social guidance. In this way, the 
individual is seen to be the agent through which society 
functions, the medium in which social purposes and 
ideas are realized. 

Individuals vary greatly in their abilities to appro- 
priate social purposes and ideas by reproducing them in 
their own experience and thus making them guides for 
conduct. Idiots and insane persons are largely wanting 
in this ability, whereas geniuses possess it to a conspicuous 
degree. Some individuals, furthermore, are more capable 
of appropriating social purposes and ideas in one field 
than in another. Consequently, one excels in manual 
arts, commerce, or politics, while another excels in science, 
music, or religion. The individuals of one race may differ 
from those of another in the ability to appropriate social 
purposes and ideas. 

IV 

An understanding of both the social and the individual factors, 
although they are abstractions, is necessary to the control of human 
development. 

The individual and society are two abstractions; i.e. 
things that can be separated in imagination, but not in 
reality, as in the case of whiteness and the substance 



32 The Principles of Education 

which is white. There can be no society without indi- 
vidual human beings, and there can be no individual 
human beings without society. Even when some anchor- 
ite monk retires to his solitary life in the desert and when 
some Robinson Crusoe is lost on a far-away island, they 
cannot get rid of the social factor in experience, but 
take with them purposes and ideas which, before their 
isolation, they got from society and could never have 
acquired in any other way. 

v Although the social and the individual factors are 
known only as abstractions, the recognition of both of 
them is essential to the understanding and control of 
human development, and has, therefore, important prac- 
tical consequences. The law of gravitation, too, is an 
abstraction ; but the builder of air ships who neglects it 
is bound to meet failure or even disaster in the world of 
practical affairs. 

Two illustrations may be given which show serious 
consequences in the control of human development that 
have come from a failure to recognize the full importance 
of one or the other of these factors. 



The neglect of the individual factor, as exemplified in the thought 
of Plato, led to a separation of theory and practice, which retarded 
human development. 

In his study of human nature, Plato neglected the indi- 
vidual factor in human development. He lived at a 
time when loss of faith in social tradition had in a con- 
spicuous measure abandoned men to the guidance of 
undisciplined and capricious individual desires. Dis- 
integration of the state and degeneration of the individual 
were resulting. Some authoritative regulator of human 



The Larger Factors in Human Development 33 

action was needed. Under such conditions, it was a very 
natural mistake for Plato, in seeking this, to turn from a 
direct study of the more or less undisciplined, capricious, 
and therefore chaotic nature of the individual, and to 
center his attention upon only the regulative or social 
factor in human life. 

Plato said that the nature of the individual appeared 
to be so small and intricate that direct study of it was 
difficult. With the thought that one who sees something 
written in large letters can afterwards read more easily 
the same thing written in small letters, because he knows 
what to look for, Plato assumed that society is the in- 
dividual written large; and that by studying the nature 
of society, he could read in big letters the nature of the 
individual man. Thus he failed to make a direct study 
of the individual process and based his understanding 
of human nature upon the study of the social factor 
alone. 

The study of the social factor does not reveal how 
ideas come into being. This is true, because, as we have 
learned, the process for making ideas in accordance with 
social patterns is peculiarly individual ; the individual is 
the agent through which society functions, the medium 
in which social purposes and ideas are realized. Plato 
could not, therefore, understand how ideas are made; 
and, not understanding this, he naturally assumed that 
they were not made at all, but always existed. Having 
decided that ideas are eternal, he found an easy step to the 
conclusion that eternal ideas are more valuable than the 
changing, perishing things of the world, and consequently 
that in order to secure the highest development, man 
should turn away from temporal things of the world and 
look with the " eye of the soul " upon eternal ideas. 



34 The Principles of Education 

This conclusion means that ideas are purer and more 
divine in nature in the degree that they are free from 
connection with the temporal practical affairs of life, 
which are supposed to contaminate them. According to 
Plato's philosophy, the highest development of men 
required, therefore, that they live as much as possible in 
a realm of pure abstract thought rather than in the world 
of practical action. The heavenly halos of these ideas, 
as seen in his poetic fancy, had blinded him to the impor- 
tance of the very world of practical affairs in which, as 
shown above, his problem originated. In a word, because 
Plato, through a failure to find the true nature of the 
individual process, failed to understand how ideas are 
actually made, he was led logically to separate the realm 
of thought from the world of practical action; or, to 
state it more briefly, to separate theory and practice. 

Plato believed, it is true, that ideas should control 
the practical affairs of life, but he separated ideas from 
these affairs by attributing to them (1) a noble origin 
independent of the practical world, and (2) an intrinsic 
value that made the pursuit of them preeminently worth 
while, apart from their practical application. He says 
that the ideal men, the philosophers, who have been 
trained by years of abstract thinking, " must be con- 
strained to lift up the eye of the soul, and fix it upon that 
which gives light to all things ; and having surveyed the 
essence of good, they must take it as a pattern, to be 
copied in that work of regulating their country and their 
fellow-citizens and themselves, which is to occupy each 
in turn during the rest of life ; — and though they are to 
pass most of their time in philosophical pursuits, yet 
each, when his turn comes, is to devote himself to the 
hard duties of public life, and hold office for his 



The Larger Factors in Human Development 35 

country's sake, not as a desirable, but as an unavoidable, 
occupation." 1 

Plato's theory of the origin of ideas would lead thought 
to commit suicide; for, as we shall see later, the very 
ideas upon which thought feeds are not gifts from heaven, 
but are worked out by human beings in the solution of 
problems created by difficulties in the practical life. 
Without the practical, changing world with its difficulties 
and consequent problems, there would be no ideas and 
thought would perish. 

Let Plato's emphasis upon the value of thought for 
its own sake, an emphasis mistaken because the direct 
study of the individual was neglected, be tested by the 
effect which the ideal of mere theoretical study has had 
upon human development. Only a few conspicuous 
examples need be mentioned. Descendants of virile 
Greeks who helped to save Europe from oriental invasion 
ignored great vital problems upon the solution of which 
human advancement depended, and consumed their time 
in quibbles over formal doctrines in the philosophical 
schools. When all western Europe was crying out for 
guidance to escape superstition, injustice, crime, poverty, 
and disease, thousands of the most capable men were 
turned from the study demanded by the best interests of 
humanity and were led to devote their lives to a vain 
attempt to get nourishment from the dry husks of 
scholasticism, long after the juices had been extracted. 
Even to-day, the school, which should start the indi- 
vidual aright in this practical world, is tending too much 
to force the pupil, distracted by effort, to seek knowledge 
merely for its own sake. When such is the case, the 
pupil, as we shall explain definitely later, does not get 
1 Plato, The Republic, Bk. VII. 



36 The Principles of Education 

the true meanings and values of the facts learned, because 
he does not recognize the practical service of these facts 
in human life. Verily, whenever thought is separated 
from practice, thought itself loses both its true meaning 
and its true worth. 

A general estimate of the value of Plato's influence 
should not be based merely upon the mistake he made 
by not giving adequate recognition to the individual 
factor in experience. His name, as we shall explain 
later, is written large in the history of the development of 
civilization. 1 

Our purpose here is only to see that the individual 
factor must be taken into consideration in getting a true 
understanding of the nature of human development; 
and that, if this is neglected, the consequences may be 
serious. 

VI 

The neglect of the social factor, as exemplified in the thought of 
Rousseau, led to making caprice the guide of conduct. 

Many centuries after Plato, Rousseau attempted to 
find the nature of human development by studying the 
individual alone. Social practices developed by earlier 
generations had been outgrown so that they no longer 
met the needs of the times, and were, therefore, oppres- 
sive. The government had become tyrannical; the 
church, arbitrary; the school, formal. Rousseau, with 
his strong hatred of restriction and with his erratic judg- 
ment, came to the conclusion that " the whole sum of 
human wisdom consists in servile prejudices " ; and that 
" our customs are nothing more than subjection, worry, and 
restraint." 

1 See pp. 304-305. 



The Larger Factors in Human Development 37 

According to him, the individual human being is 
naturally good and in isolation from social influence 
would grow into the highest type of manhood ; but, like 
a plant trampled in the highway, the individual is turned 
away from a natural development, and therefore cor- 
rupted, by social regulation. Society was represented, 
as has been said, to be the result of a deliberate agreement, 
a " social contract," entered upon by independent human 
beings, each having in mind his own advantage. Men, 
accordingly, were supposed to have developed their judg- 
ments of what things were worth while and their ideas 
of how to attain these before society existed; for these 
judgments of worth, these ideas of method, according to 
Rousseau, were the guides which led men to form a 
society. If men were developed before society existed, 
the latter was not a factor in that development. 

Rousseau's position, if carried out logically, would make 
impossible the very individual growth which he sought. 
Only under social guidance can the individual get the 
purposes and ideas which constitute his development, — 
purposes and ideas which are the result of the cooperative 
work of the brightest minds of the race during thousands 
of generations. Without social regulation, human nature 
would be at the mercy of caprice. 

Rousseau, consistent only in his inconsistency, ignored 
even logical regulation. In one place he says that the 
child should receive nothing from others, and should dis- 
cover the truth for himself; but in another he advises 
that the child be placed under the direction of a tutor. 
To the extent to which the tutor guides him, the child 
obviously learns from another and is thus brought under 
the social regulation which has been imposed by society 
upon the tutor. 



I l 

38 The Principles of Education 

Rousseau's theory, mistaken because he neglected the 
social factor, may be tested by the effect which such 
ignoring of social regulation has had upon human develop- 
ment. Politically the criticism of Rousseau's mistake is 
written in the blood of the French Revolution, in so far 
as the Revolution was a blind destructive fury against 
social regulation. This destruction of social authority 
meant anarchy. Educationally the criticism of Rous- 
seau's mistake is written in the erroneous practices of 
those who give undue emphasis to the spontaneous in- 
terests of the child by ignoring the fact that these interests 
can neither be understood nor profitably guided without 
the light of social purposes and ideas. Such persons are 
liable to mistake amusement for study and merely to 
indulge the child on his own level without promoting his 
development. 

Rousseau's theory was in a large measure beneficial 
to human .development, because generally in the institu- 
tional life of his time too little attention was given to the 
individual, and his one-sided theory tended to correct 
this condition. In education, for instance, he called 
attention to the importance of the interests of the child, 
which were neglected. Taken alone, Rousseau's theory 
is nevertheless illogical and injurious, because by neglect- 
ing the social factor he leaves man without regulation. 

VII 

The third factor, the educational, unites the individual and the social. 

Human development may be examined under two con- 
ditions, either as completed or as progressing. In the 
analysis given above, attention was centered upon it as 
completed. In finding the nature of the social factor, 






The Larger Factors in Human Development 39 

we considered man as a " social animal/' a member of 
society, " a social outcome rather than a social unit ; " 
in finding the nature of the individual factor, we imagined 
the human being known as Martin Luther to have ex- 
perience acquired in different nations and at different 
times. Here only the social and individual factors are 
revealed. When, however, we study human develop- 
ment in the process of making, we find a third factor, 
which does not appear as a part of the completed product. 
This is the process through which social guidance is 
exercised, through which social purposes and ideas are 
selected and made available for the individual. It is 
the process that unites the individual human being and 
society. 

Individual development under social guidance begins 
at infancy. Although the infant may be in the midst of 
the busy scene of social action, rich with its purposes and 
ideas, he is as helpless to make use of these purposes and 
ideas in promoting his development as he is helpless to 
make use of the food which society has in store for him, — 
and for the same reason. In either case, that which is 
best for him at the time must be selected and presented 
in a way adapted to his nature. 

This selection and presentation of social patterns is 
done through the various forms of institutions, which 
may be classified as the home, industry and commerce, 
the state, the church, and the school. In the case of the 
school, the selection and presentation are done deliber- 
ately; but in the cases of the other institutions, they 
take place more or less incidentally in connection with 
the doing of other things. The main purpose of a shoe 
factory, for example, is to make shoes ; but as the indi- 
vidual is promoted from easier to more difficult work, he 



40 The Principles of Education 

finds the best ways of making shoes selected for his 
acquisition and adapted to his ability to appropriate the 
purposes and ideas necessary to do the work. In like 
manner his growth is provided for in the home, the 
church, and the state. The more these institutions 
deliberately concern themselves with his development, 
the more effectual are they in promoting his acquisition 
of social purposes and ideas. In the selection of the 
curriculum and in the processes of teaching, the school 
deliberately undertakes to socialize the individual by 
giving him the best purposes and ideas which society 
has in store for him. 

The greater the number and complexity of the purposes 
and ideas necessary for full participation in social life, 
the longer is the period of infancy, or dependence, during 
which they are acquired by the individual. In the com- 
paratively simple life of primitive man, it lasted only to 
the earlier teens ; in the complex civilization of the present, 
it is half again, if not twice, as long. Step by step in this 
advance, institutions have increased in educational 
importance. 

That which brings the individual and the social factors 
together, uniting them in the development of a social 
person, by selecting purposes and ideas and by adapting 
them for acquisition by the individual, is the educational 
factor in human development. 



The Larger Factors in Human Development 41 



VIII 

Natural science explains human development as the acquiring of 
nerve connections which promote adjustment of the human or- 
ganism to environment ; and the three factors of this develop- 
ment as (1) the incomplete organism in which new connections 
between stimuli and responses can be made, (2) the racial inherit- 
ance of forms of response to stimuli, and (3) certain systems of 
group habits, such - as education and government, which select 
racial forms of response and cause the developing organism to 
acquire them. These three factors are the physical counterparts 
of the individual, the social, and the educational factors, which we 
have considered from the teleological point of view. 

Let us see how the conclusions which we have now 
reached from the teleological point of view are supported 
by the authoritative and accurate conclusions of natural 
science. The physical counterparts of the individual, 
the social, and the educational factors in human develop- 
ment are revealed by natural science in the explanation 
of this development as the acquiring of nerve connections 
which promote the adjustment of the human organism to 
the environment. 

As the result of a long process of variation, natural 
selection, and heredity, the lower animal organisms are 
born with ready-made connections in the nervous system 
that equip them for an adjustment to environment. It 
is due to such inborn connections, which are the physical 
basis of instincts, that the spider spins its web, the bee 
stores its honey, and the bird builds its nest. But the 
advantage of being fully equipped at birth for the battle 
of life is dearly paid for, because this equipment can be 
improved only through the slow evolutionary process by 
which it was made. Its possibilities for variation, the 
first step towards improvement, are extremely limited; 
and any improvement can be made a permanent acquisi- 



42 The Principles of Education 

tion of the species only by being fixed through physical 
heredity in the nervous structure of succeeding generations. 

Spiders, bees, and birds have made no change in abili- 
ties and in ways of acting since the days of primitive man ; 
but during this time men have increased their abilities 
and improved their ways of doing things to an astonishing 
degree. They have bettered their vision with the tele- 
scope and microscope, their hearing with the telephone, 
and their locomotion with the automobile. In spinning, 
men have advanced from the hand loom to the marvel- 
ously effective machinery of great factories ; in providing 
food, they have advanced from the precarious methods 
used by savages to the scientific methods of the farm, 
the factory, and the world of commerce; they have 
abandoned the tent of skins and the mud hut for elaborate, 
luxurious homes. 

How does natural science explain this advance ? There 
comes a time when evolutionary forces, instead of fixing 
all connections in the nervous system during the prenatal 
period, form only those which are absolutely necessary for 
life, such as those which control breathing, crying, swal- 
lowing, and digesting. The completion of other connec- 
tions between stimuli and responses takes place in the 
intricate automatic " switchboard " of the brain after the 
child is born. These acquired connections are formed in 
accordance with racial models, selected by the group and 
adapted to the nature of the organism. Thus to the slow 
process of direct physical inheritance is added a process 
of racial inheritance, through which the organism may 
profit by successful forms of adjustment made at any 
time in the race, whether by the physical ancestors of 
the organism or not. Furthermore, an incomplete nerv- 
ous system, such as that of man, makes possible greater 



The Larger Factors in Human Development 43 

variation in reactions than does the complete nervous 
system, such as that of the bee or the spider. Greater 
variation makes for rapid progress by giving a greater 
variety of reactions and therefore a larger possibility for 
successful ones, which may be fixed through the influence 
of natural selection. 

This materialistic explanation points ' clearly to three 
essential factors in human development: (1) an incom- 
plete organism, (2) a racial inheritance of forms of reaction, 
and (3) certain systems of group habits which select racial 
models for adjustment and cause the developing organism 
to acquire them. Let us examine each of these three 
factors. Fir st f the incomplete organism passes through 
a period of infancy, during which it acquires new nerve 
connections needed for adjustment. As Fiske says : 

It is babyhood that has made man what he is. The simple 
unaided operation of natural selection could never have resulted in 
the origination of the human race. Natural selection might have 
gone on forever improving the breed of the highest animal in many 
ways, but it could never unaided have started the process of civiliza- 
tion or have given to man those peculiar attributes in virtue of which 
it has been well said that the difference between him and the highest 
apes immeasurably transcends in value the difference between an 
ape and a blade of grass. In order to bring about that wonderful 
event, the Creation of Man, natural selection had to call in the aid 
of other agencies, and the chief of these agencies was the gradual 
lengthening of babyhood. 1 

Second, environmental influences guide the formation of 
the new nerve connections in the developing organism. 
With its inborn equipment for imitation, the immature 
organism acquires effective reactions under the guidance 
of more mature organisms, as when an apprentice reacts 

1 Fiske, John, The Meaning of Infancy, 1909, page 2. 



44 The Principles of Education 

more effectively in his work through imitating his master. 
It acquires useful reactions also as a result of the influence 
of tools, books, and all sorts of things that have been 
made by other organisms. The connections between 
stimuli and responses gained under such environmental 
influences, which are the result of many generations of 
progressive racial adjustment, may appropriately be called 
a racial inheritance. As Professor Baldwin says : 

The child, apart from the defective in mind or body, learns to speak, 
write, read, play, combine force with others, build structures, do 
bookkeeping, shoot firearms, address meetings, teach classes, con- 
duct business, practice law and medicine — or whatever his line of 
further development may be away from the three 'r's' of usual 
attainment — just as well as if he had received an instinct for that 
activity at birth from his father and mother. His father or mother 
may have the accomplishment in question ; and he may learn it 
from him or her. But then both the father and mother may not 
have it, and he then learns it from someone else. It is inheritance ; 
for it shows the attainments of the fathers handed on to the children ; 
but it is not physical heredity, since it is not transmitted physically 
at birth. ... It is hereditary in that the child cannot escape it. It is 
as inexorably his as the color of his eyes and the shape of his nose. 1 

Third, various systems of group habits, such as those of 
school and state, select racial models for adjustment and 
adapt them to the immature organism in such manner 
that nerve connections guiding effective responses to 
stimuli are made in the organism. These systems of 
group habits have been developed through a long process 
of evolution. This factor becomes more prominent in 
promoting human development as the racial inheritance 
becomes more complex. Without it environmental forces 
impinging upon the organism would be so multifarious and 

1 Baldwin, James Mark, Social and Ethical Interpretations, 1906, 
pp. 69-70. 



The Larger Factors in Human Development 45 

unrelated that no consistent growth of the nervous system 
could result from them. 

We can now see how natural science clearly supports 
the conclusions we have reached from the teleological point 
of view. Since the same human development considered 
from the materialistic side consists of the forming of new 
nerve connections, and considered from the mental side 
consists of the acquiring of new purposes and ideas, (1) the 
organism capable of forming new nerve connections is 
the physical counterpart of the individual capable of 
acquiring new purposes and ideas ; (2) the racial inherit- 
ance of models for adjustment which guide the forming of 
nerve connections corresponds to the social inheritance of 
patterns for purposes and ideas ; and (3) the systems of 
group habits which select racial models and adapt them 
to the organism correspond to institutions, which select 
social purposes and ideas and adapt them to the indi- 
vidual mind. Natural science supports, therefore, the 
conclusion that the individual, the social, and the educa- 
tional are the three larger factors of human development. 



IX 

A more definite study of each of the three factors marks the further 
main divisions of this book. 

The three larger factors in human development have 
been differentiated in a general way. We have found, 
also, that the individual and the social factors are united 
by the educational. Each of these factors is itself a 
complex process. In order to understand more definitely 
the nature of human development, we must, therefore, 
make a special study of each factor by separating it into 
the elements of which it is composed and by discovering 



46 The Principles of Education 

how these- elements combine to make it. We shall, 
therefore, make a more intensive study of (1) the indi- 
vidual process, (2) the social process, and (3) the educa- 
tional process. These topics indicate the further main 
divisions of this book. 

REFERENCES 

Ellwood, C. A., Sociology in its Psychological Aspects, 1912, pp. 124- 
142. (Discusses the nature of society in the light of its origin.) 

Betts, G. H., Social Principles of Education, 1913, pp. 5-30. (Dis- 
cusses the relation between the individual and society.) 

Baldwin, J. M., Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental Develop- 
ment, 1906, pp. 66-98. (Shows the relation between the indi- 
vidual and society in a discussion of the social person. Each 
student should read this discussion.) 

MacVannel, J. A., Outline of a Course in the Philosophy of Educa- 
tion, 1912, pp. 99-115, 29-31. (Gives a statement of typical 
conceptions of the relation between the individual and society, 
of the factors in the educational process, and of the function of 
education as a human institution. Suitable for advanced 
students.) 

Henderson, E. N., A Text-Book in the Principles of Education, 1910, 
pp. 109-136. (An account of the relation between the indi- 
vidual and society.) 

Thorndike, E. L., Principles of Teaching, 1906, pp. 68-104. (Dis- 
cusses individual differences.) 

Scott, C. A., Social Education, 1908, pp. 1-22. (Deals with the 
social relationships of the school.) 

Plato, The Republic, Bk. VII. (Plato's ideal of seeking knowledge 
for its own sake becomes evident in this book, the reading of 
which would be of advantage especially to mature students.) 

Davidson, T., The Education of the Greek People, 1900, pp. 128-151. 
(Criticizes Plato's social theory.) 

James, W., Talks to Teachers, 1905, pp. 22-27. (Shows in a simple 
manner that the essential function of consciousness is practical 
rather than theoretical.) 



The Larger Factors in Human Development 47 

Rousseau, J. J., The Social Contract, Tr. by H. T. Tozer, 1905, pp. 

99-117. (Suitable for advanced students who wish a direct 

introduction into Rousseau's social theory.) 
Davidson, T., Rousseau and Education According to Nature, 1907, 

pp. 77-96. (Criticizes Rousseau's social theories.) 
Fiske, J., The Meaning of Infancy, 1909, pp. 1-43. (Shows clearly 

the meaning of infancy and the part played by infancy in the 

evolution of man.) 

PROBLEMS 

1. What change must foreigners undergo in order to become true 
Americans ? 

2. Why do persons who have lived approximately all of their 
lives in the same American city differ in religious belief ? 

3. Explain the following: "Morally I am as much a part of so- 
ciety as physically I am a part of the world's fauna ; and as my body 
gets its best explanation from the point of view of its place in a 
zoological scale, so morally I occupy a place in the social order; 
and an important factor in the understanding of me is the under- 
standing of it." — Baldwin, J. M., Mental Development, 1898, p. 488. 

4. What evidence can you give in support of the statement that 
as the education of a people increases coercive methods of social 
control decrease? 

5. What concrete evidence can you give of the fact that in the 
case of human beings the period of infancy tends to become longer? 

6. What is meant by educability? 

7. Why under the same educational influences in the home and 
school do pupils of the same age attain various degrees of develop- 
ment? 

8. How does the inheritance with which a human being is born 
differ from his social inheritance? 



THE INDIVIDUAL PROCESS 



CHAPTER III 
ANALYSIS OF THE INDIVIDUAL PROCESS 

The factors of the individual process are purposes and means of 
control. A purpose, in its fullest sense, is a possible con- 
dition of the self which the individual feels to be better than 
the present condition of the self, and to the realization of which 
his activity is directed. A means of control is a thing through 
the use of which a purpose may be attained ; it has significance 
only because, in the light of reason, it is seen to be the means 
to some end. 



The factors of the individual process are purposes and means 
of control, both of which appear when the individual is in action, 
and work together in forming new purposes and new means of con- 
trol. 

Having found that the individual process is one of the 
three larger factors in human development, let us now 
analyze this process in order to find how it makes, in 
accordance with patterns given by society, new purposes 
and new ideas, which control the conduct of the indi- 
vidual and constitute his personal development. 

It is conducive to clearer thinking to substitute for the 
word idea the expression means of control. The word idea 
has been used historically with such varied meanings that 
its significance has become more or less indefinite. In the 
previous chapters, where sharp discrimination was un- 
necessary, this word could be used advantageously with- 
out exact definition; but, as our analysis becomes more 

51 



52 The Principles of Education 

detailed, the meaning intended must be stated more 
precisely. The development of the individual requires 
that he see in the things about him, such as a drinking 
cup, a pencil, a law of physics, or a rule of grammar, the 
means of control through which his purposes can be 
attained. By ideas we mean the recognition of these 
things as means of control. It is better, therefore, to 
use in place of the indefinite term idea the more definite 
expression means of control, which represents the idea 
embodied in physical form, as in the form of a drinking 
cup, a pencil, a law of physics, or a rule of grammar. It 
may be added that a law of physics and a rule of grammar 
are just as truly physical things as a drinking cup and a 
pencil ; one can see them when they are printed in a book 
or hear them when they are spoken. 

When the individual process is examined in order to 
analyze it, two sets of factors appear, — one when the 
individual is apparently at rest, because no difficulty 
challenges his effort, and the other when he is in' action, 
grappling with difficulties. This may be made plain by 
illustration. If I lean back leisurely in my chair and 
merely look at the pen with which I have been writing, 
I am apparently at rest; no problem disturbs me. Of 
this experience, there seem to be two essential factors, — I 
at one end of the experience and the pen at the other. 
Both appear to play essential parts in the experience, for 
it could not exist without both. These apparent factors 
are called subject and object. However, when I take up 
the pen and begin work, the scene changes. No longer 
do I simply contemplate the pen. The purpose of writing 
an analysis of the individual factor in human develop- 
ment looms before me ; and, confronted by difficulties, I 
strive through various means of control to carry it out. 



The Individual Process 53 

The pen, which a moment ago was a mere object of con- 
sciousness, now begins to play a new role ; it has become 
one of the instruments or means used in carrying out my 
purpose. Whenever the individual is thus in action, the 
essential factors of his experience are (1) purposes and 
(2) the means of control used for attaining them. 

In the analysis of the individual process, we are con- 
cerned primarily with the individual in action, because 
only when he is in action are new purposes and new means 
of control acquired. This may be seen more clearly 
through illustration. The new-born child, looking out 
into the world, is not conscious of the purposes felt by 
the adult ; nor does he see in the things used in the realiza- 
tion of these purposes the meanings which they have for 
his elders. Moreover, if he does no more than passively 
to look and to listen, the world about him will continue 
to appear the same ; he will remain unconscious of worthy 
purposes and meaningful things. Not until desires have 
awakened within him and he has striven to attain their 
objects can he become directly conscious of what the 
adult feels and understands as he looks upon the world. 
That the child must learn by doing is a commonplace. 
In the Book of Genesis it is recorded that God, in carrying 
out His divine purpose, created heaven and earth and the 
things that in them dwell, and then "saw everything 
that He had made." So with man; he must actually 
create the things in his experience through the process 
of working in the realizing of his purposes, before he can 
passively contemplate these things as mere objects. 

It is a fallacy of popular thought to believe that knowl- 
edge of the world is made by the interaction of subject 
and object, the factors of the individual process when the 
individual is apparently at rest. This is a very natural 



54 The Principles of Education 

mistake, because when a person stops to examine his 
experience, he finds it in a static condition for the very 
reason that he has stopped. He passively looks at the 
pen or tablet, . or merely gazes at the distant church 
steeple, and asks himself the question, How do I know 
this thing? There is activity, of course, in the attempt 
to answer the question, but this activity is engaged in 
making an analysis of the experience of himself looking 
at the object ; this activity is not the experience that is 
being analyzed. The subject and object, which appear 
under these circumstances, seem to claim responsibility 
for the making of the experience analyzed. 

Not a few great philosophers, indeed, have been misled 
in their theories of how knowledge is acquired by making 
this same mistake of confining their analysis to the mind 
in the passive condition of contemplation, in which the 
real factors of knowledge do not appear. Locke, for 
instance, took this view and thought that the subjective 
mind is like a blank tablet upon which the objective 
things of the world make their impressions through the 
medium of the senses. Another example is that of Kant, 
who with his keen logic analyzed the passive experience 
of the individual at rest, showing that the subject con- 
tributed such forms as time, space, and relation, which 
are always present, no matter what the content of ex- 
perience may be, and that the objective things of the 
world contributed the " matter of sense," which is respon- 
sible for the differences in the various objects that are 
known. He assumed that, in the making of experience, 
the object began the interaction with the subject. 

In both cases, these philosophers examined experience, 
not in the process of making, but after it had been made, 
and when, therefore, it could be an object of contempla- 



The Individual Process 55 

tion; and since the only factors apparent to them in 
experience as a completed product were the subject and 
object, it was very natural for them to assume that in 
some way these were responsible for ithe origin of the 
knowledge of things. Having made this erroneous as- 
sumption, they undertook to solve the false problem of 
how the subject and object interact to create knowledge, — 
a thing that these phases of experience never interact to 
do. ^ It is obvious that there can be no point of contact 
for interaction between the physical world and a spirit, 
which is immaterial. No more effectual criticism of such 
theories can be found than the irony of their conclusions, 
which attempt to explain how the subject and object in- 
teract to make new knowledge ; and which, at the same 
time, having the defect of metaphysical dualism, rep- 
resent the subject and object, mind and matter, to be 
realities absolutely incapable of interacting. 

Fortunately, however, it is not necessary to trace the 
shortcomings of popular thought or to point out the 
inconsistencies of the intricate metaphysical discussions 
of this matter by philosophers. Conclusions have no 
more truth than the assumptions upon which they are 
based. All the fine-spun logic that any philosopher may 
devise to show how knowledge is made through the inter- 
action of subject and object may be cast aside as ineffectual 
if only we know that knowledge is not made through such 
interaction. And we do know that neither new knowl- 
edge nor new purposes are made through the interaction 
of subject and object, because a product is one thing and 
the process through which it is made is another; and, 
therefore, when the product is separated into its com- 
ponent parts, the result is simply the parts of the product, 
not the parts of the process through which it was made. 



56 The Principles of Education 

For example, separating an automobile into the parts of 
which it is composed does not give the instruments with 
which the automobile was made. In the factory the heat 
of the forges, the power of the engines, and the shaping 
force of the machines have done their work and do not 
appear as parts of the completed automobile. Likewise, 
separating an experience of a pen, or of anything else, 
into its subjective and objective phases does not give the 
parts of the process through which it was made. Purpose 
with its heat of desire and power of will, and the shaping 
force of ideas in the form of means of control, which were 
necessary to make this experience, have done their work 
and do not appear as parts of the intellectual product. 
When, on the other hand, we examine the individual 
process in action, we find that as truly as the fire of one 
forge can kindle another fire and one machine can form 
another machine, so existing purposes and means of con- 
trol can be factors in the making of new ones. How this 
is done will appear later, and then our understanding of 
the matter will be more clear. 

II 

A purpose, in its fullest sense, is an apparently possible condition of 
the self which the individual feels to be better than the present condi- 
tion of the self, and to the realization of which his activity is directed. 
Its realization may be near or remote, and its value is known only 
through feeling, the judgments of which are absolute. A means of 
control is a thing through the use of which a purpose may be at- 
tained. It is known through reason, which sees causal connections 
among things, but which is blind to all value. 

Before placing in the court of natural science for its 
authoritative judgment the conclusion that new purposes 
and means of control are made by other purposes and 
means of control already in experience, we should state 



The Individual Process 57 

more definitely the nature of these two factors in the 
individual process. 

Purpose, in its various aspects, is termed thing desired, 
value to be controlled, value appreciated, thing worth while, 
end in view, good, ideal, intention, motive. In every in- 
stance, it is marked by a feeling of value and by activity 
intended to bring this value into realization, both of which 
attributes are indispensable. In its fullest sense, a pur- 
pose is an apparently possible condition of the self which 
the individual feels to be better than the present condition 
of the self, and to the realization of which his activity is 
directed. This does not mean that it must be selfish. 
A mother may have for her purpose herself ministering 
to a sick child, a condition that she values as more worthf ul 
than her present condition, despite the fact that it may 
include wearisome work and loss of sleep. A missionary 
may have in view himself teaching religious beliefs to a 
foreign people, although this condition means the sacrifice 
of many of the comforts of life. A soldier may feel a better 
condition of himself to be that of fighting at the front in 
defense of human rights, even though this may include 
painful hardships and even death. Thus we may see 
that the total situation is included in the condition of the 
self. However, although a purpose in its fullest sense is 
felt to be a better condition of the self, some feature is 
usually singled out to stand for the whole condition, as 
when a man is said to desire a glass of water, a chair, or a 
political office, although the complete object of his desire 
is himself drinking the water, resting in the chair, or en- 
joying the emoluments of the office. So in the other 
illustrations cited, the purposes may be said to be the 
comfort of the child, the conversion of the heathen, and 
the vindication of human rights. 



58 The Principles of Education 

Purposes vary greatly in the amount of time and 
activity necessary for their realization. Sometimes they 
are projected far into the future and require years for 
their attainment, as when a youth on entering college has 
the purpose of becoming a teacher, an engineer, or a 
physician; or when, under the inspiration of religious 
hope, a man places his purpose beyond the grave and 
works to make himself worthy of happiness in the world 
hereafter. At other times the purpose may be of a kind 
quickly realized, such as that of getting a drink of water 
or one's slippers and an easy chair, or even of continuing 
an act which is enjoyable in itself, such as riding on a 
merry-go-round or listening to an orchestra. 

The expression means of control is self-explanatory. It 
refers to whatever is used to attain an object of desire, 
or, in other words, to realize a purpose. If the purpose 
is to get an apple growing high in a tree, the means of 
control may be a ladder ; if the purpose is to speak cor- 
rectly, the means of control may be the rules of grammar ; 
if the purpose is to be a physician, the means of control 
may be a college course, followed by several years' work 
in a medical school, and a year's experience in a hospital. 

The difference between a purpose and a means of 
control is not inherent in the things themselves, but 
depends upon the attitude of the person concerned 
towards these things. The same thing may be regarded 
by an individual at one time as a purpose and at another 
as a means ; or, at the same time, it may appear to one 
individual as a purpose and to another as a means. A 
child may climb a ladder at one time merely because he 
has an immediate desire to climb it, and at another time 
for the sake of using it as a means for getting apples from 
a tree. A student who enjoys mathematics may at one 



The Individual Process 59 

time have as the direct object of his desire the solution 
of a problem in arithmetic and at another time he may use 
the problem in arithmetic as a means in the purchase 
of apples or oranges, which are the things desired. Or, 
again, a miser seeks gold for the love of it, while his 
neighbor may regard gold as the means of buying bread. 
In a word, when the individual seeks a thing which he 
feels valuable in itself and beyond which he does not look, 
his personal attitude makes it appear to him as a pur- 
pose; when he sees that a thing bears significance and 
value because of something else to which it leads, his 
personal attitude makes it appear as a means of control. 

The essential characteristic of the personal attitude 
which makes a thing appear as a means of control is 
reason. Reason sees the causal connections among things, 
but is blind — absolutely blind — to all worth whatsoever. 
The only way, therefore, in which it can be of assistance 
in determining the value of a thing is to reveal the fact 
that this thing leads to something else otherwise recog- 
nized as worth while. If a person is asked to show by 
reason why anything in the world is valuable, he must 
always reply by showing its connection as a means of 
control with something else the value of which is not 
apparent through reason but through feeling. A railroad 
time table is valuable to a vacation excursionist, not in 
itself, but because it is seen through reason to be a means 
for arranging an enjoyable trip. Richard III exclaimed 
" A horse ! A horse ! My kingdom for a horse ! " because 
reason revealed to him that a horse was a necessary means 
to the realization of his purpose in battle, the worth of 
which purpose he strongly felt. 

The fact that reason, although it can see the causal 
connections of things as means to ends, is blind to all 



60 The Principles of Education 

value, is evident when two persons who differ in their 
evaluation of the same thing appeal to reason to support 
their judgments of worth. To one man a tariff on wool 
appears to be a good thing because it leads to larger re- 
ceipts for the product of his farm ; to another it appears 
to be a bad thing because it leads to a larger expenditure 
for his clothing. Two persons can through the use of 
reason agree as to the worth of anything, whether impor- 
tant or unimportant, only when reason enables them to 
connect the things as means exclusively with some value 
or values which they both feel to be the same. A person 
explaining why he values a thing usually does not give a 
full explanation, because he does not recognize the con- 
nection of a thing with all the values that influence his 
appreciation of it. 

The essential characteristic of the personal attitude 
that indicates a purpose, is feeling. Feeling pronounces 
a thing to be worth while without reference to its connec- 
tion with anything else, and its judgments are categorical, 
or absolute. If a person is asked why he values a certain 
purpose, and the purpose still remains as such, not being 
transformed by reason into a means of control in the 
service of something else, he can reply only " Because 
I do!" On the other hand, should he transform the 
purpose into a means of control by explaining its value 
as borrowed from something else, he must, if the ques- 
tioning is pushed far enough, come eventually to the point 
where there is nothing with which to connect the thing 
as a means of control ; that is, to a judgment of feeling. 
Were it not for this fact, no value whatever could be 
known. Aristotle explained why this must be true, when 
he said : " We ... do not choose everything for the 
sake of something else, for thus we should go on to infin- 



The Individual Process 61 

ity, so that desire should be empty and vain." 1 Suppos- 
ing, now, we were to meet a student on his way to the 
library to study a problem in the history of education. 
We might question him regarding his purpose somewhat 
as follows : 

" Why do you go to the library? " 

" To solve a problem in the history of education." 

" But why do you desire to solve this problem? " 

Since the only way in which the object of his desire may 
be justified rationally is to show it to be the means to 
something else felt to be worth while, he replies, " Because 
it is valuable in getting an understanding of the history 
of education." 

" But why do you wish to understand the history of 
education? " 

" Because it gives an appreciative insight into the 
present educational situation." 

" And why do you wish to get this insight? " 

" Because I desire to become a teacher." 

" Why do you desire to become a teacher? " 

" Because I desire to help in the development of human 
life and at the same time to earn a livelihood." 

" Why do you believe that it is valuable to help in the 
development of human life? " 

" Because I do ! I Jeel that it is ! " 

Taking the other purpose assigned, we ask, "And why 
do you wish to earn a livelihood? " 

" In order to enjoy life." 

" Why do you desire to enjoy life? " 

Again comes the categorical answer, " I feel that I do ! " 

Any line of reasoning will lead to a similar result, if 
continued far enough. Whether a purpose remains as 
1 Nicomachean Ethics. Bk. I, Ch. II. 



62 The Principles of Education 

such or is pursued by reason to the limits of experience, 
its value is always known through feeling. 

Ill 

Natural science shows that (1) checks in the functioning of in- 
stincts or habits and (2) old responses which become incorporated 
with the checked instincts or habits so as to overcome the checks, 
are the factors of the process through which the organism adjusts 
itself to the environment. These are the physical parallels 
respectively of purposes' and of means of control as the conscious 
factors of the individual process in its development. 

Is the analysis that has been made of the individual 
process from the point of view of teleology supported by 
the conclusions of natural science? From the point of 
view of teleology, individual development takes place 
when a person, through the process of projecting pur- 
poses and working to realize them, acquires new purposes 
and new means of control, which together improve the 
guidance for his activity. From the point of view of 
natural science, individual development takes place when 
the psychophysical organism acquires, in response to 
stimuli, new reactions which more adequately adjust it 
to the environment. Let us now see whether the mental 
factors which teleologically appear to make new purposes 
and new means of control are the counterparts of the 
physical factors which, according to natural science, make 
new reactions to stimuli. 

Natural science teaches that the first factor in making 
a new reaction is a check or obstruction in the functioning 
of an instinct or of a habit of response to stimuli. Just 
as an obstruction in a river channel diverts the water 
through another course, so a check in the pathway of a 
habit of response diverts the energy released by the stimuli 
into a pathway leading to a new reaction to the situation. 



The Individual Process 63 

To illustrate, let us imagine an organism in which the 
visual stimulus of candy habitually passes over into the 
response of putting the candy into the mouth and eating 
it. If now the organism is subjected to the stimulus of 
candy in a wrapping of transparent waxed paper, this 
stimulus begins to pass over into the habitual pathway of 
reaction; but the eating is checked because the paper 
sets up in the mouth a stimulus which habitually passes 
over into the conflicting response of expectorating. The 
second factor now appears. Energy, blocked in the old 
pathway of the response of eating, is now diverted into 
a new one, and a corresponding new reaction is made. 
This may be tearing the paper. When the paper has been 
torn away, the stimulus of the candy can pass along the 
channel of the habit of eating, since the obstruction has 
been removed. Thus a new reaction has been developed 
in the situation involving the stimulus of candy in trans- 
parent waxed paper; namely, the reaction of removing 
the paper before putting the candy into the mouth. The 
organism is thereby better adjusted to its environment. 
To carry the illustration further, when the organism is 
subjected to the stimulus of candy in a shop window, the 
passing of the stimulus over into the habitual response 
may be checked by conflicting reactions started by the 
auditory stimulus of the sounds " Hands off ! " and the 
visual stimulus of the approaching shopkeeper. As a 
result, the response may be checked until a new reaction, 
such as giving money to the shopkeeper, is formed. 
Again, if there is an habitual reaction of getting the 
money by asking the parents, and if through any cause 
this reaction becomes ineffectual, there may be formed, 
in circumventing the check, some new response, such as 
wiping dishes or running errands. 



64 The Principles of Education 

A check in the functioning of an instinct or habit of 
reaction to a stimulus, which is the first physical factor 
in the process of adjustment, is the physical parallel of a 
purpose. If one's breathing is checked, he at once feels 
a desire to breathe, at once has in mind the purpose of 
breathing. When, as in the illustrations given above, the 
habit of eating candy is delayed in any way, the purpose 
of eating candy appears in the mind of the individual. 
Natural science, therefore, supports the teleological ac- 
count of the first factor in the making of new experience. 

The pathway of reaction incorporated with the ob- 
structed response in such a manner that the obstruction 
is overcome, the second physical factor in the process of 
adjustment, is the physical counterpart of means of 
control, which appears in consciousness. When eating 
candy is checked as described above by the presence of a 
paper wrapping, the organism responds by tearing the 
paper. The response of tearing, which obtains under 
other situations, is here modified in such manner as to 
become a part of the reaction to the stimulus of candy 
in a transparent waxed paper. In a similar way, habits 
of giving pennies to the shopkeeper, of wiping dishes, and 
of running errands become a part of the response to the 
stimulus of candy in a shop window. Since a check in 
the expression of an habitual response is the physical 
counterpart of a purpose, the new reaction which over- 
comes the check is the counterpart of a means of control 
in the service of this purpose. Natural science supports, 
therefore, the teleological account of the second factor in 
the making of a new experience. 

In the case of an organism acquiring new reactions 
through imitation, the factors are the same as those 
explained above, in so far as the brain activity is paralleled 



The Individual Process 65 

by consciousness. A check in the response of imitating 
is paralleled by a purpose to do what another person is 
doing. Then some pathway of reaction is incorporated 
with the checked response in such manner that the check 
is overcome and the imitating is realized. This pathway 
of reaction is paralleled by a means of control, which 
appears in consciousness. 

From the physical point of view, it is plain that the 
individual does not acquire new purposes and new means 
of control when he is apparently at rest, a condition in 
which the factors of his experience appear to be subject 
and object. When the organism is thus responding to a 
stimulus by merely looking at some object or by merely 
sensing it in some other way, no new response is made; 
the energy passes over a pathway of response already 
formed in the brain. It is only when the pathways of 
response are changed that new purposes and new means 
of control appear in consciousness. 

That " a little learning is a dangerous thing " is some- 
times exemplified by a loose kind of thinking which makes 
psychology seem to support the mistaken theory that 
new experience is caused by the interaction of subject and 
object, as in the case of a person merely looking at a 
pen. Here we have the I on the one hand and the pen 
on the other. In this loose thinking, the subject is con- 
fused with the psychophysical organism and the object 
with the environment. . It is true that the organism and 
the environment do interact, but they are not to be 
identified with the subject and the object. Both natural 
science and teleology, as we are about to see, pronounce 
against this mistaken identity. 

Natural science tells us that the organism is affected by 
stimuli from the environment and reacts to these stimuli, 



66 The Principles of Education 

and that the passing of stimuli over into response makes a 
brain activity which is paralleled in consciousness by a 
single experience of which the subject is one aspect and 
the object is the other. Neither subject nor object 
depends upon the organism more than the other ; neither 
depends upon the environment more than the other; 
as the two aspects of one experience, they are together 
the mental counterpart of a change in the physical organ- 
ism produced by the interaction of the organism and the 
environment. 

Teleology explains that the organism, instead of being 
identified with the subject, is as much an object in ex- 
perience as is the environment ; and that both the organ- 
ism and the environment are equally physical objects 
used by natural science in explaining mental phenomena. 
The subject is so far from being identified with the 
organism that it is distinguished in consciousness through 
its contrast with the organism, just as much as it is dis- 
tinguished through its contrast with what natural science 
terms the environment. 

IV 

Problems for further study are (1) how new purposes are made ; 
(2) how new means of control are made ; and (3) how these together 
constitute personal development. 

The individual process has now been analyzed into its 
factors, which have been found to be purposes and means 
of control. Since the development of the individual 
consists in acquiring new purposes and new means of 
control, three problems at once appear : (1) How do the 
factors of the individual process make new purposes? 
(2) How do they make new means of control ? and (3) How 
do purposes and means of control, which are both the 



The Individual Process 67 

factors and the products of the individual process, to- 
gether constitute personal development? The answers 
to these three problems complete the taking apart and 
the putting together of the individual process, or, in other 
words, its analysis and synthesis. 

REFERENCES 

Charters, W. W., Methods of Teaching, 1912, pp. 21-23. (Dis- 
tinguishes briefly between appreciation and control of values. 
Cf. purposes and means of control.) 

Howerth, I. W., The Art of Education, 1912, pp. 144-166. (Dis- 
tinguishes between ideas and ideals. Cf. means of control and 
purposes.) 

Munsterberg, H., Psychology and the Teacher, 1910, pp. 196-201. 
(Gives the strict scientific use of the term feeling.) 

Paulsen, F., A System of Ethics, 1906, pp. 11-12. (States that 
"what is good in life will in the last analysis be decided by 
immediate, incontrovertible feeling.") 

PROBLEMS 

1. a. Name five purposes you have attained to-day. b. Name 
five means of control you have used in attaining these purposes, 
c. What is the essential difference between these purposes and means 
of control? 

2. Name some purpose which you expect- to attain several years 
from now and some of the more important means of control you 
expect to use for the realization of this purpose. 

3. Name three acts that at various times you have performed 
both as ends in themselves and as means of control. 

4. Explain what corresponds to purposes and what corresponds 
to means of control in the following : "Consequently the educational 
values of different subjects . . . consist (a) in the scope, kind, 
strength, and permanence of the incentives to activity; and (6) in 
the kind, degree, and permanence of the power to think and to exe- 
cute that those subjects may develop." — Hanus, P., Educational 
Aims and Educational Values, p. 7. 



68 The Principles of Education 

5. a. What is the essential function of feeling? b. Give an 
illustration of the function of feeling taken from your own experience. 

6. a. What is the essential function of thought ? b. Give an illus- 
tration of the function of thought taken from your own experience. 

7. Is a mere knowledge of what is right a guarantee that the 
right will be done ? Explain. 

8. What evidence does the theory of evolution give in support 
of the fact that knowledge and appreciation are for the sake of action ? 

9. What justification is there for saying that an idea is an incipient 
action? 

10. According to the natural science explanation of the basis of 
consciousness, would a human being perfectly adjusted to his environ- 
ment be conscious? Explain. 



CHAPTER IV 
HOW NEW PURPOSES ARE MADE 

Acquired purposes are originally means of control to which 
feelings of value have been transferred from the ends these means 
served. The steps in the process through which a means of 
control is made into a purpose are (1) a feeling of the value of 
some purpose, (2) the association with this purpose of some 
means for its realization, and (3) the use of the means in realiz- 
ing the purpose. 



The fact that the value of a purpose is explained by transforming the 
purpose into a means to some end, suggests the way in which the 
purpose was made. 

That new purposes appear in the life of the individual 
is a matter of common experience. As a child of ten, a 
youth of twenty, and a man of forty, he has a change of 
purposes corresponding to the change in his activities, 
for purposes are the ends towards which these activities 
are directed. " And one man in his time plays many 
parts." But however pronounced the change in pur- 
poses may be, the process through which it takes place 
is not directly evident ; for, as Athena sprang full-armed 
from the head of Zeus, so purposes seem to spring im- 
mediately into consciousness, fully equipped for the 
leadership of activity. To find how purposes and means 
of control already in the experience of the individual work 
together to make new purposes, is the problem of this 
chapter. 



70 The Principles of Education 

The way in which the values of acquired purposes are 
explained suggests the way in which these purposes are 
made. It has been shown 1 that the only method by 
which the value of a purpose can be explained is that of 
transforming the purpose into a means of control for 
attaining something else felt to be worth while. That 
which was at first felt as an end desired then appears, in 
the light of reason, to be worthf ul not in itself, but because 
it serves a worthy master. The fact that the value of a 
purpose can be explained only by transforming it into a 
means of control suggests that the purpose was originally 
a means of control, recognized as valuable because it 
led to something else worth while, and that in time the 
derived nature of its value has been lost sight of, so that 
the act is felt to be worth while in itself. 

II 

The transforming of means of control into purposes through (1) 
a feeling of the value of some purpose, (2) the association with this 
purpose of some means of control for its realization, and (3) the 
use of this means in realizing the purpose, is a common and neces- 
sary happening in everyday life. 

The change of means of control into purposes, or ends, 
is a common happening in everyday life. A man in the 
city locks his house at night for the purpose of protecting 
the valuable contents. Locking the house has therefore 
a value only as the means to something else. But, when 
the act has been repeated regularly, he may feel at night 
a desire to lock the house, although he does not, at the 
moment, call to mind the original purpose for doing so. 
Locking the house has now become an end in itself ; that 
is, a purpose. Categorically it commands his activity. 

1 P. 59. 



How New Purposes Are Made 71 

Even if he moves to the country where there is no danger 
from thieves, he will nevertheless feel at night a desire to 
lock the house, and may do so, unless he tests the value 
of this purpose by reasoning about it and finds that the 
act, when viewed as means, is connected with an end no 
longer worth while. At first the housewife washes dishes, 
not for the sake of the process, but because in the light of 
reason dish-washing is seen to be the means to other 
things desired. In time, however, she does not first have 
in mind these other things, but rather feels directly that 
dish-washing itself is a thing worth doing. When a man 
is accustomed to go to his office each morning for the 
purpose of transacting business, going to the office may 
appear to him as an end in itself. A person who would 
otherwise be indifferent to the study of the principles of 
education and who undertakes such study only as one of 
the means in the realization of his purpose to become a 
teacher, may later, when the hour for study arrives, feel 
directly that he should resume work in the principles of 
education, without thinking of the end which originally 
made him conscious of its value. 

In the same way, a person acquires such general pur- 
poses as being industrious, neat, honest, just, and temper- 
ate. He is indifferent to these virtues until they are 
found to be the means of securing such desirable ends as 
rewards, freedom from punishment, social approval, and 
values promised by religion, and of securing many other 
ends with which in everyday life they are connected in a 
natural and intrinsic way. The child may feel in these 
general purposes only worths which have been transferred 
to them because he has found them to be means to free- 
dom from punishment and means to approval by those 
dear to him; the adult may feel in these purposes rich 



72 The Principles of Education 

composite values because he has found them in the service 
of many worthy consequences with which they are in- 
trinsically connected. 

Acquired purposes may become endowed with great 
independent authority. Individuals will lay down their 
lives for country and home, the cherishing of both of 
which is acquired. They will make the greatest sacrifices 
in the service of truth, honor, and justice. Indeed, even 
when the value is a false one, its authority may not easily 
be surrendered. Older people, under the influence of 
feeling, often persist in holding to " the good old ways " 
when newer ways are better. How many persons feel 
the value of such things as seeing a new moon over the 
right shoulder or avoiding Friday as a time for beginning 
important enterprises, even after these felt values are 
known to have sprung from childish superstitions no 
longer believed ! The fact that Friday is an unpopular 
day for weddings and for the sailings of vessels is practical 
evidence of the persistence of one of these purposes. 

The illustrations that have been given reveal three 
essential steps in the making of a new purpose : (1) the 
value of some purpose previously acquired must be felt, 
(2) some means for realizing this purpose must be asso- 
ciated with it, and (3) this means must be used in realiz- 
ing the purpose. 

The more strongly the value of the original purpose is 
felt, the more quickly and effectually is it carried over to 
the means. A young woman who has been given a ring 
as a means of symbolizing her betrothal, may feel at once 
a stronger immediate purpose to preserve the ring than 
the normal value of the ring would command. A child 
that has been burnt dreads the fire as soon as he recog- 
nizes it as the means of his suffering. A man who has 



How New Purposes Are Made 73 

accidentally shot a friend may by this one experience 
acquire a desire to avoid firearms, the very sight of them 
arousing in him a feeling of revulsion. Out of one inci- 
dent may be born a purpose to foster the friendship of a 
person whose help has been a means of escape from dire 
distress. A person who has found religious belief a means 
of consolation in the presence of death may feel from that 
moment a desire to cherish this belief. 

The greater the variety of valuable purposes which a 
means is seen to serve, the richer and more composite is 
the worth transferred to it. For this reason a virtue such 
as honesty, industry, or justice appears as primarily an 
end to be desired even when the individual is conscious 
of some purpose in relation to which it is a means of 
control. The value transferred to it from many other 
purposes completely overbalances in importance the value 
of the particular end with relation to which the individual 
at the moment regards the virtue as a means. A thing 
such as a pen or a knife, which has been associated mainly 
with only one purpose, appears as primarily a means of 
control if consciously connected with this purpose. The 
value transferred to it from other purposes does not over- 
balance in importance the value of the purpose with rela- 
tion to which the individual regards the thing as instru- 
mental. If, however, an individual has in mind a pen 
or a knife without thinking of its normal use, he may 
regard it as primarily valuable in itself rather than as 
instrumental in nature. An individual, for instance, who 
reaches for his fountain pen and finds that it is lost, may 
feel its value without being conscious of the important 
purpose in the service of which it has been found useful. 
Since everything is connected with more than one purpose, 
even when the thing is regarded as a means of control, there 



74 The Principles of Education 

is an accompanying feeling of its value that depends upon 
purposes with which it has been connected, but which are 
not now in consciousness. The pen with which one in- 
tends to write may, for example, seem to have a value 
immediately appreciated and not dependent upon his 
purpose of writing. 

A purpose, as has been stated, 1 is dynamic ; it involves 
not only a feeling of value, but also activity to bring this 
value into realization. While every feeling of value marks 
an incipient action, this action may be very weak, so that 
the result goes no farther than a faint desire or wish. If 
the original purpose is so feeble that action for its realiza- 
tion does not persist, whatever feeling of value may be 
transferred to the means is obviously impotent to com- 
mand action, and the means cannot, therefore, receive 
from the abortive purpose the strength necessary to make 
it an end in itself. Thus it is that individuals acquire 
many feelings of value that are easily recognized, but are 
too feeble to command conduct. Such feelings of value 
may be of service, however, if the individual, under reli- 
gious or some other ethical influence, acquires a purpose 
to do the best he can, as in the case of a person who in 
religious conversion acquires the desire to do what God 
would have him do. The weak appreciations made of 
the values of many acts then point out what is best and 
are transformed into purposes through serving this new 
ideal. Religious sanction is often very powerful in vital- 
izing in this manner weak appreciations so that they 
become strong purposes, as the change in conduct that 
often results from religious conversion gives evidence. 

If the primary purpose is strong, and therefore marked 
by persistent activity, the means used in its service may 

l F. 57. 



How New Purposes Are Made 75 

become an end in itself, even before the primary purpose 
has been realized. Instances of new purposes developed 
under these circumstances may be found when individuals 
regard great social practices, such as equal suffrage, pro- 
hibition, and international arbitration, as ends in them- 
selves, although they have only begun work to secure the 
adoption of these social practices. Even in cases where 
the means sought is a mistaken one and the welfare 
expected cannot be secured through it, if the primary 
purpose is marked by persistent activity, the means may 
be crowned with a halo of derived value as an end in 
itself. History recounts many mistaken causes and many 
lost causes that through values acquired from ends 
unrealized have taken direct command of the labor and 
sacrifice of men. An illustration of a cause that was 
felt in this way to be valuable, although both mistaken 
and lost, is the persecution of early scientists as a means 
of protecting religious faith. 

There are some acts, — drinking, lying, and stealing, 
for example, — that seem to have negative values ; one 
feels that they should be avoided rather than performed. 
The general principle, however, applies here as well. To 
avoid a thing in order to attain some purpose is a way 
of acting with reference to it, a way of using it in the 
service of a purpose. In order to secure business and 
social success, and to avoid ill health, poverty, and do- 
mestic unhappiness, one must not drink intoxicants; in 
order to keep one's friends, to secure success in business, 
to be respected, and to attain many other values, one 
must avoid lying and stealing. When value has been 
transferred from the end originally served, avoiding a 
thinec may become an end in itself. 

The change of means into ends is necessary in everyday 



76 The Principles of Education 

life, if the individual is to carry out his life's work effec- 
tually; for otherwise, in deciding what should be done 
from moment to moment, his mind would be so occupied 
with following the complex network of threads connecting 
means with remote purposes that there would be no time 
for anything else. Imagine a man about to be run down 
by an automobile not appreciating the fact that he should 
get out of the way until he thought of certain remote 
values and discovered by a process of reasoning the worth 
of getting out of the way as a means of attaining them ! 
What if the house-wife or the business man had to begin 
with remote values and reason out the worth of every 
other act as means to these ends before knowing what 
should be done from moment to moment ! If means did 
not become purposes, how much time would be lost every 
day in tracing the reasons for being industrious and 
honest ! 

Ill 

The methods commonly used to create new purposes give prac- 
tical evidence that purposes are originally means of control to 
which feelings of value have been transferred from the ends these 
means of control served. 

Since purposes command the conduct of the individual, 
the way to influence his behavior is to control the making 
of his purposes. Methods commonly used to do this give 
practical evidence in support of our conclusion as to how 
purposes are acquired. In order to make a child feel the 
worth of industry, he is placed in situations where indus- 
try is a means of avoiding pain and of securing reward, 
even if the parent or teacher acts arbitrarily in creating 
these situations. In a similar way, when the child be- 
comes a man, society may regulate his feelings of value 



How New Purposes Are Made 77 

more or less arbitrarily by making certain acts the means 
of securing approval or of avoiding disapproval on the 
part of those with whom he is associated, and even by 
making certain acts the means of avoiding fines and 
imprisonment administered by authorized representatives 
of the state. To lead a person to feel the true value of 
being temperate, he is shown in the light of reason the 
many worthful ends that are served by temperance and 
is impressed with the evils of intemperance. In this way 
he is made to recognize temperance as a means of avoiding 
certain evils and of securing certain good results. For 
the sake of creating party loyalty, which consists of a 
purpose to further the interests of the party as an end in 
itself, the political speaker recounts the many advantages 
his party has been the means of securing for the local 
community, the state, and the nation. References to 
great statesmen may be added to this, the national flag 
may decorate the rostrum, and patriotic music may be 
played, so that the individual gets the impression that 
support of this particular party is a means of promoting 
the welfare of society, of carrying on the work of states- 
men who are appreciated as important factors in shaping 
the destinies of his country, and of being patriotic. 

One common way of developing purposes is through 
advertising which creates in the individual a predilection 
for that which is advertised. To create a purpose to use 
a certain kind of breakfast food, the pleasures of a meal 
are pictured. A dining car commanding a view of in- 
vigorating mountain scenery is represented. An im- 
maculate waiter has placed on the snowy white table, 
along with fresh carnations and roses, a portion of the 
breakfast food, garnished with berries or other fruit. In 
connection with the picture, there may be also adjectives 



78 The Principles of Education 

such as appetizing, invigorating, and delicious. The ob- 
server is made to feel strongly the pleasurable value of 
eating and to associate with this value, as a means to the 
enjoyment of it, the breakfast food advertised. Adver- 
tisements of guns and ammunition picture stimulating 
hunting scenes, suggesting that the particular kinds of 
guns and ammunition represented are means to enjoy- 
ments such as these. An advertiser of clothing represents 
the wearer of garments of his make as enjoying social 
pleasures and commanding the attention of men of affairs. 
To put a halo of acquired value about certain brands of 
silver-plated tableware, value is borrowed from the 
honeymoon by depicting the bride in her attractive new 
home ecstatically examining the articles advertised. 
Makes of automobiles are pictured amid charming sur- 
roundings to the enjoyment of which the machines appear 
to be the means. 

Even where the true value of the thing advertised is 
doubtful, a purpose to use it may be created. A large 
signboard pictures a throng of workmen engaged in con- 
structing the Panama Canal. The observer is impressed 
by the wonders accomplished. Then he sees the repre- 
sentation of a plug of a certain brand of tobacco together 
with the words, " The men who chew are the men who 
do." This sentence is so worded that it will not only 
stick in the mind but cling with surprising tenacity to 
the picture with its halo of value, — all for the purpose 
of transferring some of the appreciation one has for the 
construction of the canal to the chewing of the tobacco 
advertised. Again, advertisers draw upon the popular 
admiration for baseball heroes to create feelings of worth 
about their several brands of cigarettes, and suggest 
other values by such adjectives as pleasurable, enjoyable, 



How New Purposes Are Made 79 

satisfactory, and invigorating, and by slang expressions 
that appeal even more vividly to the imagination. 

In these instances of the methods commonly used in 
making purposes only two steps have been presented, 
— the calling forth of an appreciation of value, and the 
associating with this value of means for realizing it. 
Whether the individual takes the third step, that of 
activity in realizing the value appreciated, depends not 
only upon the influence of this value but also upon the 
freedom of the pathway of activity from obstacles, espe- 
cially at its beginning. In the early crusades against 
intemperance, a drunkard, after he had been led to appre- 
ciate the value of temperance, was asked to begin action 
by merely signing a pledge card. After a reader has been 
led by an advertisement to desire some commodity, he 
may be asked merely to fill out and mail a blank or to 
call at a neighboring store. When a child has been 
impressed by the value of industry, he is more likely to 
try to realize this ideal if temptations that would interfere 
with industrious action have been removed. 

IV 

All purposes are not derived, but to isolate those which are 
original, or primary, is difficult. 

If purposes already in the experience of the individual 
are factors in the making of new ones, the individual must 
be endowed with an original stock of these to begin the 
process. For this reason, in explaining the values of pur- 
poses by reducing them to means of control in the service 
of other things that are valuable, one must sooner or later 
reach a purpose the worth of which is known only by feel- 
ing and for the value of which no reason can be assigned. 
These ultimate, or primary, values are the originals. 



80 The Principles of Education 

It is difficult to isolate them, because the farther the 
web connecting means with ends is unraveled in explain- 
ing the values of purposes, the more complex it is found 
to be. Usually the value of an acquired purpose is very 
composite because it has been derived from a number of 
worthful ends in the service of which what is now a new 
purpose formerly appeared as a means of control. In 
turn, each of these more remote purposes has likewise a 
composite value. Indeed, even original, or primary, 
purposes are caught again and again in the web connecting 
means with ends, so that they themselves acquire a 
composite worth through instrumental connections with 
other ends, either ultimate or derived. To live is an 
ultimate purpose, since it is desired often when no reason 
for this desire can be given ; yet, at other times, a man 
may desire to live for the sake of providing for his family, 
of bringing about some social betterment, or of accomplish- 
ing something else upon which his heart is set. In ro- 
mantic love wherein the lover is guided only by feeling, 
the desire for a mate is felt as ultimate; but he may 
desire a mate also as a means for providing a home and 
family, so that in old age he may have cherished 
companionship. 

V 

The fact that virtuous acts have an apparently external authority 
independent of the ends which they are known to serve, and the fact 
that in any particular situation the end does not justify the means, 
do not conflict with the conclusion that acquired purposes are 
originally means of control to which feelings of value have been 
transferred from the ends these means served. 

Two facts seem to conflict with the conclusion to which 
common experience has led us. One is that virtuous 
acts, the worth of which has been represented as acquired, 



How New Purposes Are Made 81 

have an apparently external authority independent of 
the values of the ends which they may be known to 
serve ; the other is the generally accepted belief that the 
end does not justify the means. However, if the con- 
clusion that acquired purposes are originally means of 
control is properly understood, neither of these facts 
militates against it. 

Thousands of individuals, it is true, bow before the 
authority of such virtues as truthfulness, honesty, justice, 
temperance, without ever having been conscious of the 
connection between these virtues and the ultimate values 
to which they intrinsically lead, and which, according to 
our conclusion, are the real source of their authority. 
But the web of connection has been woven, nevertheless. 
For countless generations society has been weaving it for 
individuals and recording the results in history, literature, 
art, customs, and institutions. Society approves these 
virtues because it has discovered their intrinsic connec- 
tions with valuable results, and the individual accepts 
them upon social authority. But even in accepting ideals 
upon social authority, the individual does so only because 
he sees them as means to a worthy end. When he has 
understood and used them as means for securing social 
approval and for avoiding social disapproval, these pur- 
poses transfer to them rich composite values. Even in 
the case of religious sanction, a feeling of the worth of a 
virtuous act is acquired by the individual in a similar 
way as means to the highly valuable purpose of securing 
divine approval. The feeling of the un worthiness of 
vice may be explained likewise, since, as we have learned, 
avoiding a thing is a way of using it in the service of a 
purpose. 

With regard to the well-fixed belief that the end does 



82 The Principles of Education 

not justify the means, it must be acknowledged this 
belief is true if by end only one particular end is meant. 
Stealing cannot be justified as worthful because in a 
particular instance it is connected with desirable conse- 
quences. A poverty-stricken individual may satisfy his 
immediate needs by theft while the wealthy corporation 
from which the property is taken may never feel the loss, 
and yet the act of theft should be avoided as a thing of 
negative worth. This is true because the evil of the 
act of stealing depends not upon one consequence but 
upon many. The felt values of these many consequences 
become transferred to the means and are fused into the 
feeling that marks the negative value of this vice. There- 
fore, although stealing may be the means to a particular 
end which, taken in an isolated way, appears as good, 
still it has a great residue of negative value derived from 
other consequences that are evil; and this residue of 
negative value marks the act as a vice, a thing to be 
avoided, irrespective of any particular end to which it 
may lead. In reality, one particular act of theft cannot 
be isolated; it has many consequences, among which is 
the tendency to make the individual a thief under other 
circumstances when the immediate results may be de- 
cidedly harmful. The belief that any particular end 
does not justify the means does not militate, therefore, 
against the truth that ideals get their values, often very 
composite ones, from the ends which they originally serve. 



How New Purposes Are Made - 83 



VI 

Ethical theory, which includes a critical study of the nature of 
values, supports the conclusion that acquired purposes are orig- 
inally means of control to which feelings of worth have been 
transferred from the ends these means served. Even the two ex- 
treme schools of moralists, taken together, support this conclusion. 
The utilitarian emphasizes the fact that means derive value from 
the ends they serve, while the intuitionalist emphasizes the fact 
that value is known directly only through feeling. By the uniting 
of these fractional truths, the whole truth is revealed. 

Ethical theory, which includes a critical study of the 
nature of values, supports the conclusions to which com- 
mon experience has led us in seeking an answer to the 
problem of how new purposes are made. With regard to 
the way in which the individual comes to an appreciation 
of moral distinctions, ethical theory furnishes, in addition 
to intermediate schools, two extreme groups of witnesses, 
who, instead of agreeing upon a definite conclusion, are 
often opposed to each other in their testimony. One 
group is called the utilitarian, empirical, or teleological 
school, and the other is called the intuitional, formalistic, 
or moral sense school. The utilitarian lays stress upon 
the fact that the worth of many purposes is derived from 
some ultimate value or values which these purposes 
serve ; he would say that justice is good because it pro- 
motes human welfare, happiness, or some other end. 
The intuitionalist lays stress upon the fact that the ap- 
preciation of value is always immediate; he would say 
that the goodness of justice is recognized directly by our 
moral sense. In order to reach a true conclusion, it is 
necessary to take the testimony of both groups and sift 
in each the true from the false. Fortunately, we are 
greatly assisted in this by the fact that ethical discussions 



84 The Principles of Education 

have been, as a rule, very controversial, and that each 
school has given much attention to impeaching the testi- 
mony of the other where the other is at fault. As Socrates 
of old said, men differ in their beliefs with regard to the 
same thing because they see only a part of the truth. 
If, therefore, the testimony of each group is taken, and 
any error resulting from a partial point of view which 
fails to reveal the full nature of ethical judgment is 
eliminated, the remaining testimony when put together 
gives the whole truth. In this way it may be seen that 
the two schools of ethical thinkers are not essentially 
antagonistic, but supplementary to each other. 

Between the extreme utilitarian and the extreme in- 
tuitionalist there are many types of ethical theory which 
are not so one-sided ; these embody to a greater or less 
degree what is included in both schools. Since these 
intermediate views are true to the extent to which they 
embody the truth revealed by the two extremes and 
avoid the error of each, it is necessary to find the truth 
only in the extreme theories in order to get from ethics 
conclusive testimony with regard to the nature of the 
judgment of value. 

The extreme, or hedonistic, utilitarian has his eyes 
fixed upon the fact that values are originally means of 
control. For this group we may let Herbert Spencer 
speak: "From whatever basis they start, all theories of 
morality agree in considering that conduct whose total 
results, immediate and remote, are beneficial, is good 
conduct; while conduct whose total results, immediate 
and remote, are injurious, is bad conduct. The happi- 
ness or misery caused by it are the ultimate standards by 
which all men judge of behavior. We consider drunken- 
ness wrong because of the physical degeneracy and accom- 



How New Purposes Are Made 85 

panying moral evils entailed on the transgressor and his 
dependents. Did theft uniformly give pleasure both to 
taker and to loser, we should not find it in our catalogue 
of sins. Were it conceivable that benevolent actions mul- 
tiplied human pains, we should condemn . them — should 
not consider them benevolent." 1 By such argument the 
extreme utilitarian makes it appear that the only thing of 
absolute value is pleasure, and that acts get their values 
only because they are in the service of pleasure. 

Even the extreme utilitarian cannot ignore the fact 
that there must be some value which is not utilitarian, 
but absolute; which is not derived as means, but is 
known immediately through being felt. Pleasure may, 
in truth, be a purpose. When a man is at leisure, he 
may say to himself, " I wish to have an enjoyable time ; 
what means shall I use to get pleasure? " Then he may 
decide to go fishing, to play golf or tennis, to ride in an 
automobile, to dance, to attend a banquet, or to read a 
book. It is true also that pleasure enters prominently 
into the worth of very many complex values when men 
are led to do things because the acts are agreeable as 
well as otherwise worthful. Moreover, it is true that 
the pursuit of pleasure appears to be an original, or 
primary, purpose, because it is desired when no possible 
explanation of why it is valuable can be made. However, 
in assuming that pleasure is the only philosopher's stone 
which turns acts into gold, the utilitarian has overlooked 
many other absolute values. In seeking the source of 
value, his attention is drawn into the wrong direction 
and centered upon pleasure, because when one desires 
a thing, there is a feeling of pleasure in anticipating it. 
His mistake becomes apparent in the light of the fact that 
1 Spencer, Herbert, Education, 1890, pp. 161-162. 



86 The Principles of Education 

one cannot get pleasure unless one is capable of having a 
desire for something else. This may be made clear by 
the following anecdote. An Englishman was seated on 
the bank of a stream, fishing. A native approached him 
and informed him that there were no fish in the stream, 
whereupon the Englishman replied that he was not fish- 
ing for fish, but for pleasure. 1 As Professors John Dewey 
and James H. Tufts say : " The fundamental fallacy of 
psychological hedonism has been well stated by Green 
to be supposing that a desire can be aroused or created 
by the anticipation of its own satisfaction — i.e., in sup- 
posing that the idea of the pleasure of exercise arouses 
desire for it, when in fact the idea of exercise is pleasant 
only if there is already some desire for it. Given a 
desire already in existence, the idea of an object which 
is thought of as satisfying that desire will always arouse 
pleasure, or be thought of as pleasurable. But hedonism 
fails to consider the radical difference between an object's 
arousing pleasure, because it is regarded as satisfying 
desire, and the thought of a pleasure arousing a desire : — 
although the feeling of agreeableness may intensify the 
movement towards the object. A hungry man thinks 
of a beefsteak as that which would satisfy his appetite; 
his thought is at once clothed with an agreeable tone and 
the conscious force of the appetite is correspondingly in- 
tensified ; the miser thinks of gold in a similar way ; the 
benevolent of an act of charity, etc. But in each case the 
presence of the pleasurable element is dependent upon 
the thought of an object which is not pleasure — the 
beefsteak, the gold. The thought of the object precedes 
the pleasure and excites it because it is felt to promise the 

1 Paulsen, F., A System of Ethics, Tr. by Professor Frank Thilly, 
p. 255. 



How New Purposes Are Made 87 

satisfaction of a desire." l In brief, the extreme utili- 
tarian, through a false analysis, mistakes the pleasure in 
the desire for the object of the desire, whereas the pleasure 
exists in the desire only when something else is the object 
of the desire. 

There is an overwhelming array of witnesses to refute 
the testimony of the hedonistic utilitarian where he makes 
the mistake of assuming that pleasure is the only ultimate 
source of worth. The self-indulgent man who gives him- 
self up to pleasure-seeking soon finds that in order to get 
pleasure he must stimulate his jaded desires for other 
things, and that the more strenuously he seeks pleasure 
the less of it he gets, because through over-indulgence he 
destroys the desires for other things. The glutton, for 
instance, impairs his appetite and thereby decreases his 
pleasure in eating; in order to enjoy eating, he must 
stimulate his desire for food. Verily, many a man who 
has drunk the bitter dregs of life's cup can testify to the 
truth of the paradox of hedonism that to aim at pleasure 
is to miss it. But our witnesses do not come only from 
the ranks of sinners. The goodness of an act is greatly 
lessened in the estimation of men in general if the indi- 
vidual is found to have done it merely for the purpose of 
getting pleasure. History has demonstrated that the 
noblest path may lead through the Garden of Geth- 
semane to the crown of thorns and the cross, where the 
least suggestion that the motive is to secure pleasure, 
even in the world hereafter, is an affront to our 
sensibilities. 

Hedonistic sophistry may assert that a good act, 
though painful in itself, may be undertaken because the 
individual desires the pleasure which comes from the 
1 Dewey and Tufts, Ethics, pp. 269-270. 



88 The Principles of Education 

approval of conscience. But conscience gives the pleasure 
of its approval because the act is felt to be worthy. The 
pleasure of conscience does not make the act worthy; 
conscience does not approve a good act because it is 
pleasurable to approve it, but because the act in itself is 
felt to be good. 

Finally, can we believe that value depends upon pleas- 
ure alone when, in doing so, we must admit that all of 
the great characters who down through the ages have 
sacrificed themselves in a struggle to advance civilization 
have been deceived in their judgments of worth and have 
lived in vain? As Munsterberg says: " Has mankind at 
the height of the twentieth century really more pleasure 
than the savage tribe in the bushes? Has the man who 
is burdened with the responsibilities of highest culture 
really more pleasure than the shepherd who lies in the 
sun, and does the shepherd have more fun than the dumb 
beasts around him? Has not every step in civilization 
meant new difficulties and new problems, new conflicts 
and new responsibilities, new labor and new hardship? 
If pleasure is the goal, let us escape from civilization, let 
us throw off our proud achievements and let us learn 
from the herds of the meadow, which live for their sensual 
instincts/' l 

Here again, the hedonist is ready with his sophistry to 
assert that, although the pleasures of civilization are no 
more in quantity than those of savagery, they are higher 
in quality. But to assert that value depends upon any- 
thing else than the amount of pleasurableness is to deny 
the hedonistic standard, by recognizing a standard of 
worth that is not based upon pleasure, but upon something 
else which makes one pleasure better than another. This 
1 Miinsterberg, Hugo, Psychology and the Teacher, p. 45. 



How New Purposes Are Made 89 

something else is the value of the act with which pleasure 
is associated ; and the worth of the act, therefore, gives 
value to the pleasure rather than the pleasure giving value 
to it. 

In contrast with the utilitarian, the extreme intuition- 
alist has his eyes fixed upon the fact that worths are 
immediately appreciated. His belief is best exemplified 
by the popular idea of conscience, or the moral sense, as 
an infallible guide, which is supposed to know immediately 
the value of an act the first time the act is brought before 
it. " This theory holds that rightness is an intrinsic, 
absolute quality of special acts, and as such is immediately 
known or recognized for what it is. Just as a white color 
is known as white, a high tone as high, a hard body as 
existent, etc., so an act which is right is known as 
right. In each case, the quality and the fact are so inti- 
mately and inherently bound together that it is absurd 
to think of one and not know the other. As a theory 
of moral judgment, intuitionalism is thus opposed to utili- 
tarianism, which holds that rightness is not an inherent 
quality but one relative to and borrowed from external 
and more or less remote consequences." 1 

It is true that ultimate ends are known only intui- 
tively and that derived values are recognized by the indi- 
vidual through immediate appreciation. However, when 
the intuitionalist says that immediate appreciation is the 
only authority for the worth of all ideals, he does not look 
far enough to see that many values are not original, or 
primary, but derived. 

The extreme intuitionalist points to human experience 
in support of- his statements, but the very witnesses whom 
he calls to support his position make it clear that part 
1 Dewey and Tufts, Ethics, p. 318. 



90 The Principles of Education 

of his theory is not true. What a motley array of wit- 
nesses, — liars, thieves, adulterers, murderers, together 
with patriots, reformers, and saints ! They all agree that 
a white color is white, but do they all agree as to the 
moral quality of the same act ? There is scarcely a crime 
which was not at some time in the history of the race felt 
by individuals as a worthy act in the light of conscience, 
and the conscientious conflicts of the present day show 
that the moral sense is not an infallible authority. As 
soon as the saints attempt to reform the sinners, to create 
in them a new sense of what is worth while, they must 
begin to reason with them, and the moment they begin 
to reason about values, they turn their backs upon the 
intuitional doctrine, for to show the reason for a value is 
to show it to be worth while, not in itself, but rather as a 
means to some end upon which its worth depends. In- 
deed, ethical theory came into existence just because our 
immediate feelings of the values of acts are neither uni- 
form nor absolutely reliable, and must, therefore, be 
supplemented by a rational attempt to find the values of 
acts in the light of the ends which they serve. 

To sum up the evidence, the utilitarian has given unim- 
peachable testimony that many values are derived, but 
his testimony can be refuted when a failure to see that 
there are many ultimate ends leads him to say that only 
one exists. The intuitionalist has given unimpeachable 
testimony that some values are ultimately known only 
through immediate appreciation, but his testimony can 
be refuted when a failure to see the derived nature of 
many values leads him to say that intuition is the only 
authority. Putting together the parts of this testimony 
that must be accepted, we have the view of the matter 
which this chapter attempts to make clear ; namely, that 



How New Purposes Are Made 91 

some purposes are original, or primary, and that others 
are means of control to which feelings of value have been 
transferred from the ends that they serve. 

Thus far, it must be understood, we have permitted 
only the extremists to testify. Many ethical thinkers 
who have taken intermediate positions are in substantial 
agreement with the conclusion advocated here. Those 
utilitarians who do not select some one special value, such 
as pleasure, for the ultimate worth from which all other 
values are derived, but who consider the ultimate end to 
be human welfare or perfection, are not blind to a part 
of the truth if they recognize the fact that since the will 
aims at definite, concrete activities, welfare or perfection 
is an empty abstraction, unless filled with a variety of 
concrete ultimate values. Those intuitionalists who hold 
that only general rules or classes of ends are known 
ultimately through immediate appreciation, are not blind 
to a part of the truth if they recognize that these general 
rules or classes of ends have significance only in that they 
designate groups of particular values each of which is 
felt to have absolute worth. 



92 The Principles of Education 



VII 

According to natural science, the steps in the physical process 
which parallels the forming of a new purpose are : (1) a response 
to stimuli checked in its functioning ; (2) a diversion of nervous 
energy into some channel of response not previously connected with 
this reaction, — a physical process by which the check may be 
removed ; (3) an incorporation, through action, of the new response 
with the old habit. These steps are the physical counterparts of 
(1) the feeling of the value of some purpose, (2) the association 
with this purpose of some means for its realization, and (3) the use 
of the means in realizing the purpose. Natural science supports 
also the conclusion that some feelings of value are not derived from 
others, but are original, or primary. 

Let us now see how natural science supports with its 
authoritative evidence the conclusion that has been pre- 
sented from the teleological point of view with regard to 
how a new purpose is made. The physical counterpart 
of a purpose, according to natural science, is a response 
to stimuli checked in its functioning. Just as changes in 
the nervous system due to the stimuli of vibrating air 
and ether are accompanied by the consciousness of sounds 
and colors, and thus give "as in a symbolic language, 
news of the external world," so changes in the nervous 
system due to the reactions to these stimuli are accom- 
panied, when checked in their functioning, by purposes, 
and thus give, as in a symbolic language, news of the 
responses to this world of external vibration. The light 
stimulus of an apple affects the nervous system of a child. 
As the result of nervous connections made previously, 
this stimulus tends to pass over into the response of eat- 
ing. But if the fruit is on a table beyond the child's 
reach, or if he has to walk across the room or is otherwise 
delayed in getting the apple, the reaction of eating is 
checked in its functioning, although it may go even so 



How New Purposes Are Made 93 

far as to make his mouth " water." Under these physical 
conditions, he feels a desire to eat the apple,. he appre- 
ciates the worth of carrying out the action for which the 
nervous system has been set. If the reaction persists, 
if it is not abortive, the child feels a purpose. 

Natural science would explain the illustrations given 
in the first part of this chapter 1 by saying that in such 
cases brain connections have been established between 
certain stimuli and the responses of locking the door, 
washing dishes, going to the office, and studying the 
principles of education ; " and that when evening comes 
and the man is in the upper part of the house, when the 
meal is finished and the housewife is engaged in con- 
versation, when eight o'clock arrives and other activities 
interfere with going to the office, and when the hour for 
the study of the principles of education has struck and 
the student is at a distance from the library or is invited 
to go walking, the reactions for which the nervous systems 
of the respective individuals have been set, although 
started by appropriate stimuli, are checked, because the 
situations in which the individuals are at the time do not 
for the moment permit the completion of the reactions, 
or give stimuli setting off also other reactions which 
interfere with them. When the activity is obstructed, 
each feels a desire which makes him conscious of the end 
of his action and of its worth. If the tendency to the 
activity continues, the conscious accompaniment is a 
purpose. 

Since a purpose is the conscious parallel of an obstructed 
reaction, a new purpose must be the accompaniment of 
a new obstructed reaction. The materialistic explana- 
tion of the steps in the making of a new reaction, a new 

1 Pp. 70-71. 



94 The Principles of Education 

habit of response, must point, therefore, to the physical 
counterpart of the making of a new purpose. Let us 
now examine the steps in the making of a new habit of 
response and then find their mental counterparts. 

In the process of adjustment to environment, new 
habits of response are made as modifications in the nerv- 
ous system. The usual steps in the physical process 
through which a new reaction is added to an old one are : 
(1) a reaction checked in its functioning ; (2) a diversion 
of nervous energy into some channel of response not 
previously connected with this reaction, — a physical 
process by which the check may be removed ; and (3) 
an incorporation, through action, of the new form of 
response with the old habit. ' The experiences of which 
these steps are the physical counterparts may now be 
found. (1) A reaction checked in its functioning is the 
physical counterpart of a purpose ; (2) new reactions to 
the situation which may overcome the check are the 
physical parallels of the consciousness of means of con- 
trol in the service of the purpose ; and (3) the incorpora- 
tion, through action, of the new response with the old 
habit is the physical parallel of the use of the means in 
the realization of the purpose. 

Before the new response has been completely incor- 
porated with the old habit, the old habit will be checked, 
in a greater or less degree, in the situation under which 
the new response first appeared, and the new response, 
although it now will appear more easily, will still have as 
its conscious accompaniment the idea of a means of con- 
trol. When, however, the process has been completed 
so that the new response has become an integral part of 
the habit, this new part of the reaction, when checked, may 
be accompanied by a purpose which parallels it alone. 



How New Purposes Are Made 95 

When the purpose is thus the accompaniment of only a 
new form of reaction, it appears as a new purpose. Nat- 
ural science supports, in this way, the conclusion pre- 
sented from the teleological point of view with regard 
to the process by which new purposes are made. 

Interpretation with the use of illustrations may make 
the matter plainer. (1) When the individual, now re- 
garded as a psychophysical organism, is writing and the 
process of writing is interrupted by the ink's ceasing to 
flow from his fountain pen, there appears in his conscious- 
ness a purpose revealing the character of the reaction 
somewhere ahead of the check. This purpose may be 
that of making the ink resume its flow. (2) Owing to 
certain physical conditions, nervous energy may be 
directed into channels producing the response of jerking 
the pen. On the side of consciousness, this jerking of the 
pen appears first as a means of control for carrying out 
the purpose. (3) The reaction of jerking the pen removes 
the obstruction and the original reaction of writing is 
continued. This process is paralleled by the feeling of 
an act of will in realizing the purpose. After this new 
reaction of jerking the pen has been fixed as a nervous 
connection, if it is called forth by the ink's ceasing to 
flow under conditions noted above and then checked in 
its functioning, because the stimuli from surrounding 
objects, for instance, set off reactions inhibitory to throw- 
ing ink, the purpose of jerking the pen appears. The 
acquired reaction has now become, when checked in its 
functioning, the physical condition for a new purpose, 
since there is an immediate feeling that jerking the pen 
is the thing that should be done. 

Again, (1) the activity of a teacher may be checked in 
guiding a class from short to long division. This check 



96 The Principles of Education 

is paralleled in consciousness by a purpose along the line 
of activity; that is, to make the class understand the 
arrangement of divisor and quotient in long division. 

(2) There may be, under these conditions, the response 
of putting the divisor at the left and the quotient at the 
right in some examples in short division, instead of using 
the usual arrangement. This process appears in the 
consciousness of the teacher as a new means of control. 

(3) The difficulty is removed and the original reaction of 
guiding the class to the acquisition of long division, so far 
as the arrangement of divisor and quotient is concerned, is 
completed. This step is felt as an act of will, using the 
means of control in the realization of the original purpose. 
If the new form of presentation has become fixed as a 
connection between stimuli and response, and if, per- 
chance, the reaction is called forth by appropriate stimuli 
and delayed in functioning by the absence of a piece of 
chalk, there may appear in the mind of the teacher the 
purpose of writing a quotient in the form employed in 
short division. The new reaction has now become, when 
checked in its functioning, the physical counterpart of a 
new purpose. 

Natural science supports also the conclusion that the 
individual is endowed by nature with certain apprecia- 
tions of worth, as well as with the ability to acquire new 
appreciations. Reactions are both original and acquired. 
Original reactions, which are called instincts, are nervous 
connections with which the individual is endowed at 
birth as the result of thousands of generations of evolu- 
tionary development. Many, however, are delayed in 
their functioning ; for example, those which appear in 
adolescence ; and many are " vague, variable, and rough - 
hewn," so that it is possible for the " instinctive tendency 



How New Purposes Are Made 97 

to produce, not some one single habitual act, a replica of 
itself, but a number of different habits, each fitted to some 
special set of situations." 1 Acquired reactions are called 
habits. Now, original, or primary, values, the worth of 
which is immediately felt but cannot be explained tele- 
ologically by reason, are the accompaniments of instinctive 
reactions checked in their functioning ; and acquired pur- 
poses are the mental counterparts of acquired reactions 
checked in their functioning. Furthermore, the trans- 
forming of an acquired purpose into a means of control 
for the purpose of explaining its value corresponds to the 
relating of an acquired reaction to the more funda- 
mental response with which it was incorporated in over- 
coming an obstruction. When an original reaction is 
reached, obviously it cannot be viewed thus as a mere 
modification of a more fundamental response, and cor- 
respondingly reason finds here its limit in the explanation 
of value. The crude skeleton of an example, which dis- 
regards many connections, may be given for the sake of 
simplicity and brevity. A teacher is endowed by nature 
with an instinct to eat ; teaching school is a modification 
of the activity of getting food ; and the new method of 
going from short to long division is a modification of his 
activity in teaching school. If he explains in the every- 
day terms of teleology why he appreciates the value of 
the method used in teaching long division, he looks farther 
along the line of activity and shows that this method is 
justified as a means for attaining the end of teaching. 
If he is asked why he desires to teach, he looks farther 
along the line of activity and shows that this is a means 
for getting food. If he is asked why he feels the value of 
getting food, he explains that it is a means to eating. If 
1 Thorndike, E. L., The Elements of Psychology, p. 189. 



98 The Principles of Education 

he is asked why he appreciates the value of eating, and 
eating appears only in its pure, instinctive form, he can 
make no further explanation. In the instinct, the physi- 
cal parallel of the ultimate or original value has been 
reached. 

REFERENCES 

Bagley, W. C, The Educative Process, 1907, pp. 218-224. (Discusses 

briefly ideals from the point of view of education.) 
Spencer, H., Education, chapter on Moral Education. (Presents 

methods of moral education from the utilitarian point of view.) 
Paulsen, F., A System of Ethics, Tr. by Frank Thilly, 1906, pp. 340- 

346, 233-239, 251-270. (Presents clearly the nature of judgments 

of worth, discusses the question Does the end justify the means ? 

and criticizes the ethics of pleasure seeking.) 
Munsterberg, H., Psychology and the Teacher, 1910, pp. 41-46. 

(Criticizes the ethics of pleasure seeking.) 
Dewey and Tufts, Ethics, 1909, pp. 269-275, 317-325. (Criticizes 

hedonism and moral sense intuitionalism.) 

PROBLEMS 

1. What does a person lack who knows the right but does not 
doit? 

2. a. Find in one of the standard magazines five advertisements 
each of which tends to create a predilection for some article by 
representing it as a means for attaining some value or values appre- 
ciated by the reader, b. Explain concretely how each advertisement 
creates a predilection for the article advertised. 

3. Name five ideals you have attained because you have asso- 
ciated the acts represented by them with the securing of mere social 
approval. 

4. Name five purposes you have attained because you have asso- 
ciated the acts represented by them with desirable ends other than 
that of social approval. 

5. Ask five individuals why they believe that a person should 
be truthful and honest, and decide from the answers given whether 



How New Purposes Are Made 99 

the values they feel for these virtues were derived from the securing 
of mere social approval or in part at least from intrinsic ends which 
truthfulness and honesty serve. 

6. a. Who has had the strongest moral influence upon you? 
6. How do you explain this influence? 

7. Why is the conscientious explanation we make of our reason 
for doing some act often inadequate? 

8. Why is our immediate feeling that an act is wrong usually a 
better guide for conduct than later reasoning which makes the act 
appear right ? 

9. If children do not cooperate for social ends in the home and 
school, should we expect them to have strong social ideals when they 
become adults, even though they study about these ideals? Give 
the reason for your answer. 

10. Explain the statement that the best way to get pleasure or 
happiness is to forget it. 



CHAPTER V 
HOW NEW MEANS OF CONTROL ARE MADE 

New means of control are made through finding new uses 
for. things in carrying out purposes. The essential steps in the 
complete process by which a new means of control is made, are 
(1) experiencing some difficulty in realizing a purpose, (2) 
defining the problem which must be solved in order to overcome 
the difficulty, (3) solving the problem, and (4) using the solu- 
tion in overcoming the difficulty. The problem is defined and 
solved by the use of hypotheses made through analogy and tested 
in thought or in action, or in both. The uses of things as means 
of control constitute the meanings of the things. These mean- 
ings become so closely associated with the things as to appear 
inherent in them. 

I 

New means of control are made through finding new uses for 
things in carrying out purposes. The essential steps in the com- 
plete process by which a new means of control is made, are (1) ex- 
periencing some difficulty in realizing a purpose, (2) defining the 
problem which must be solved in order to overcome the difficulty, 
(3) solving the problem, and (4) using the solution in overcoming the 
difficulty. The problem is defined and solved by the use of hy- 
potheses made through analogy and tested in thought or in action, or 
in both. 

When a new difficulty arises in carrying out a purpose, 
a new means of control competent to overcome this diffi- 
culty is sought. As a rule, this new means does not 
spring into consciousness with the seeming spontaneity 
that marks the appearance of a purpose, but is the result 
of a process of which the individual may be directly con- 

100 



How New Means of Control Are Made 101 

sciotfs. To find, through an analysis of this process, how 
purposes and means of control already in experience work 
together to make new means of control, is the problem of 
this chapter. 

Means of control, as we have learned, 1 appear in the 
form of things; for example, a drinking cup, a pencil, 
a law of physics, printed in a book, or a rule of grammar, 
likewise evident. Things become new means of control, 
obviously, when new uses are found for them in giving 
the control necessary to bring about the realization of 
purposes. How the individual finds new uses for things 
may be shown by illustrations. 

Imagine the case of a person who, for the purpose of 
writing a letter, applies his fountain pen to the paper 
and finds that the pen does not make a mark. If he 
knew by what means the ink could be made to flow from 
the pen, he would use this means, and the writing would 
be resumed. But he does not know what means to use. 
(1) He has thus projected a purpose and met with a diffi- 
culty in realizing it. 

The individual now sets about to locate definitely the 
difficulty. Perhaps, he imagines, there is no ink in the 
penholder; but he remembers that the holder was filled 
only a half hour before. Perhaps the tube that conducts 
the ink from the holder to the pen point is misadjusted; 
but examination reveals that it is in the proper position. 
Perhaps this feed tube is clogged with dried ink. Let us 
assume that all evidence, such as the facts that the pen 
has not been used for a long time and that the tube 
appears to be stopped up, points to this as the location 
of the difficulty. The individual then becomes conscious 
of a definite problem ; namely, What means may be used 

i P. 52. 



102 The Principles of Education 

to remove the ink from the feed tube? (2) The difficulty 
has thus been located and given the form of a definite problem. 

A problem appears when, the individual is conscious of 
a purpose, but not of the means for its realization. The 
purpose marks, or defines, the problem, which appears in 
the form of the question, How can this purpose be carried 
out? When the means of writing fails, the problem 
which first appears may be expressed by the question, 
How can the writing be done ? In this form, however, 
the problem is vague and general, — it is not well defined. 
In order to define it better, to make the difficulty more 
clear and specific, the individual must find a purpose 
which lies in the line of action immediately beyond the 
difficulty. In the illustration, this is the purpose of re- 
moving the dried ink from the pen tube. It marks 
definitely what must be accomplished in order to over- 
come the difficulty ; and for the time being it takes the 
place of the purpose of writing the letter. If the problem 
is complex, — that is, if several means of control must 
be found in order to overcome the difficulty, — this 
complex problem must be subdivided into simpler ones, 
each of which is defined by a purpose immediately ahead 
of each means of control needed. 

The method of defining the problem, as can be seen 
from the illustration, consists of making hypotheses, — 
that is, imagining what may be the difficulty, — and 
testing these hypotheses to determine whether they are 
true. Hypotheses are suggested through similarity of 
the new situation in which a difficulty has arisen to other 
situations in which the difficulties have been defined. 
The fact that one cannot drink lemonade through a straw 
tube if the lemonade has been exhausted from the glass, 
or if the straw tube is misad justed, or if the straw tube is 



How New Means of Control Are Made 103 

clogged by pulp or by a seed, may suggest the hypotheses 
given above in the illustration; or generalizations made 
from a number of similar instances where the passage of 
some substance through a tube is concerned, may suggest 
them. Hypotheses may be tested both in thought and 
in action. Testing in thought is trying the hypotheses 
in imagination and consists in calling to mind facts that 
agree or conflict with the hypotheses. When the indi- 
vidual in the illustration calls to mind the fact that he 
has filled the pen only a half hour before, he tests an 
hypothesis in thought and finds it untrue, because this 
fact conflicts with it. The hypothesis that the feed tube 
is misadjusted is tested in action by examining the tube. 
When the problem has been defined, the individual 
may have in his stock of means of control previously 
acquired one that will overcome the difficulty. In this 
case, he can make use of it without further delay. But 
if he does not know how to overcome the difficulty, he 
must proceed to find a new means of control. In other 
words, (3) he must solve the problem. As in the case of 
defining the problem, this is done by making hypotheses, 
and testing them in thought or in action, or in both. He 
has used a pin to pick lint from the opening in the end of a 
small key and, because of the similarity of the two situa- 
tions, imagines that the obstruction in the pen tube may 
be removed with a pin. When this hypothesis is tested 
in imagination, he sees that the tube is so small that the 
pin cannot be inserted into it.. An attempt may be made 
actually to insert the pin into the tube, especially if the 
test in thought is doubtful. Testing the hypothesis in 
imagination, if conclusive, is better than testing it in 
action, because testing in imagination saves the time 
and energy necessary to get the pin and avoids the danger 



104 The Principles of Education 

of injuring the tube by an attempt to force the pin through 
it. The removal by blowing of fruit pulp or a seed ob- 
structing a straw may now suggest through the similarity 
of the two situations that the dried ink may be removed 
by blowing through the feed tube. Trying this in thought, 
the individual finds the hypothesis useless, in view of the 
fact that dried, ink adheres so closely that it cannot be 
dislodged by blowing. If this test in thought is not 
convincing, he may test the hypothesis actually by try- 
ing to blow through the feed tube, with the probable 
result either of losing time in washing the tube or of 
getting ink upon his lips. The fact that he has cleaned 
small glass bottles and other things with water, or the 
generalization from such experiences that water is a 
solvent, suggests, through similarity of the two situa- 
tions, that perhaps water may be the means of removing 
the clogged ink. This hypothesis is tried in imagination 
and found apparently to work. Testing in action may 
be done by putting the tube into water and finding that 
the ink begins to dissolve. 

When the hypothesis that water is a means of removing 
the dried ink from the tube has been tested and found to 
solve the problem, the ink is removed and the realization 
of the purpose of writing the letter continued. In other 
words, (4) he uses the solution of the problem in overcoming 
the difficulty. This fixes the new means of control in the 
experience of the individual so that, when the same kind 
of difficulty occurs with a pen, it will not be necessary for 
him to go through the process of inventing a means of 
control for overcoming the difficulty; for he will have 
stored in memory and ready for use the fact that water 
is a means of removing dried ink from the feed tube. 
Also, when he meets a new kind of difficulty that bears 



How New Means of Control Are Made 105 

some resemblance to this one, his experience with the 
clogged feed tube may, through analogy, suggest hypoth- 
eses which will define the problem or become the basis 
of solution in the case of the new difficulty. 

Let us consider next an illustration where, in carrying 
out the purpose of writing, the individual did not ex- 
perience a mechanical difficulty, but experienced the 
difficulty of not having some of the general ideas which 
the writing required. This illustration has been selected 
in view of the facts that it is an account of an actual 
rather than of an imaginary experience ; that a first-hand 
knowledge of the details is available; that it may be 
stated briefly, owing to the reader's familiarity with the 
contents of the previous chapter ; and that it will afford, 
with new motivation, a review of the essential ideas of 
the previous chapter. 

Some years ago, when the author began to teach the 
principles of education, he had the purpose of writing an 
outline of the course. It was evident that principles for 
controlling the process through which new purposes are 
made should be included in the outline, because the 
school, in order to make the pupils socially efficient, must 
guide the development of their purposes as well as the 
development of their knowledge of the means through 
which purposes can be realized. When, however, the 
place was reached for stating these principles, a difficulty 
was met, because the writer had not in his previous ex- 
perience acquired them in definite and usable form. (1) 
Thus a difficulty was met in carrying out the purpose for 
which the writing was begun. 

An hypothesis was made that perhaps purposes are 
given by nature through intuition, that they spring 
spontaneously into consciousness, and that the way in 



106 The Principles of Education 

which they are made cannot, therefore, be found. This 
hypothesis was rejected when tested in the light of several 
facts, as follows : We live, according to natural science, 
in a world of uniformity, a world of law, and if new pur- 
poses appear, there must be some antecedents necessary 
to their appearance. It is a matter of common experience 
that a child may be put under influences which will 
develop in him good purposes, or he may be put under 
influences which will develop in him bad purposes. The 
development of his appreciations of value may, therefore, 
be controlled. Again, since literature and the other fine 
arts lead the individual to form new purposes by develop- 
ing in him appreciations of value, there must certainly 
be some principles in accordance with which the fine arts 
do this, principles which not only reveal the essential 
nature of the fine arts, but also may guide in the teaching 
of them. 

It was known that the steps in the development of new 
means of control could be found through an analysis of 
the self -active process — the process of projecting pur- 
poses and realizing them. This fact suggested the hypoth- 
esis that the making of new appreciations of value could 
be explained with relation to the same process. The 
hypothesis was accepted as true, because individuals 
acquire new purposes in the activities of everyday life, 
where they are concerned with realizing values through 
means of control. This was the first step in narrowing 
the problem. 

The fact that difficulties in getting other ideas had 
been overcome by making analyses of the objects under 
consideration, and the fact that analyses in other instances 
had been made simpler by graphic representation, led 
to the hypothesis that analysis through the use of graphic 



How New Means of Control Are Made 107 

symbols should be used here. This was tested by trying 
it. The self -active process was represented thus : 
P = present condition of the self 
M = means of control 
J = ideal condition of the self (purpose) 

I was analyzed and found to consist of a form of action 
plus a feeling of its value for the self. M was examined 
and found to consist of some form of action. Since both 
M and I are ways of acting, if M could acquire a feeling 
of value so that it would be felt worth while in itself, it 
would become a purpose. Since there seemed to be no other 
way for the new purpose to appear, (2) the problem was ten- 
tatively defined as follows : How can a means of control get 
an immediate rather than an instrumental value? 

(3) In solving the problem, the hypothesis that a 
means of control may acquire value from the end which' 
it serves, appeared as the result of analogous situations in 
which things acquire values from objects of value asso- 
ciated with them. Mere clods of dirt, to which a person 
would ordinarily be indifferent, are regarded with feeling, 
if they mark the grave of a friend. Numerous things, 
such as relics, incite an emotional glow from the fact 
that they have been associated with other things that 
appeal to the emotions. 

This hypothesis was tested in thought. The first test 
was made in the light of psychology. In the psychologi- 
cal explanation of desire, which involves the apprecia- 
tion of the value of some object for the self and is essen- 
tial, therefore, to a purpose, it was found that desire 
arises when an habitual reaction, called forth by stimuli, 
is obstructed in its expression. It was found also that 
new habits, which form the physical accompaniments 
of new purposes, appear first as means of getting around 



108 The Principles of Education 

obstructions in the functioning of old habits, which form 
the physical accompaniments of old purposes. New pur- 
poses, consequently, must appear first as means of 
control in the service of old purposes. 

The hypothesis was tested also in the light of ethics, 
which is a science of moral values, and. has developed as 
the result of many centuries of thought. The utilitarian 
theory was found to give evidence in favor of the hypoth- 
esis that purposes are originally means of control, but 
this evidence was apparently nullified by the fact that the 
intuitional theory did not support this hypothesis. The 
authority of ethical thinkers could not be accepted, so long 
as their testimony conflicted with regard to the matter 
under consideration. Here arose a new difficulty, which 
was overcome through finding a means by which the 
testimony of the utilitarians and intuitionalists could be 
harmonized. When this had been done, ethics appeared 
to support the hypothesis. Overcoming this new diffi- 
culty required the four steps in the process for making a 
new means of control. In taking these steps, much 
assistance was received, of course, from books on ethics. 

After the hypothesis had been tried still further in the 
light of a number of facts of common experience, a final 
test was made by applying it to the explanation of the 
function of the fine arts and of the essential steps in teach- 
ing them. The hypothesis was applied first in making 
an explanation of the nature of the Twenty-Third Psalm 
and of the methods of teaching it. 1 This explanation 
was verified by comparison with a successful attempt to 
bring out the value of this psalm in a booklet entitled 
The Song of Our Syrian Guest. 2 Facts learned about 

1 See' pp. 219-221. 

2 By William Allen Knight ; The Pilgrim Press, Boston. 



How New Means of Control Are Made 109 

the teaching of literature through practical experience in 
teaching this subject in a high school' seemed to support 
the hypothesis. After further apparently satisfactory 
applications to the fine arts, 1 the hypothesis was accepted 
as the proper solution of the problem and (4) was used in 
continuing the writing of the outline. 

As a third illustration, let us consider a case in which 
the difficulty was to find the special use of a thing. 
Several years ago, a young man received as a Christmas 
present a piece of cloth which was a yard or more square, 
had a small hole in the center, and was adorned with 
needlework. On opening the package, he stared inquir- 
ingly at the contents, an evidence of his difficulty, and N 
then said, " What is this thing? " (1) He had ex- 
perienced a difficulty in carrying out the purpose of assign- 
ing to the decorated cloth some special use for which the 
donor evidently intended it. (2) He then reduced the 
difficulty to the definite problem, What special use could a 
man make of the cloth? This problem was suggested 
by the fact that other presents he had received were for 
his personal use, and the suggestion seemed to be reason- 
able. (3) In his attempt to solve the problem, the first 
hypothesis, resulting from analogy, was that the cloth 
might be a stand cover, but this hypothesis was set aside 
in view of the fact that a stand cover would not have a 
hole in the center. The analogy which gave rise to the 
hypothesis that solved the problem was as follows : The 
young man's roommate had a bag to cover a dress suit 
when hung in a closet, in order to protect the suit from 
dust. After the suit had been put on a combined coat 
and trousers hanger, the bag was slipped over it from the 
bottom and confined about the hook of the hanger with 
i See pp. 227-236. 



110 The Principles of Education 

a draw string. The shape of the cloth with a hole in the 
center resembled the bag, if the bottom of the bag were 
not considered. This analogy led to the hypothesis that 
the purpose of the cloth might be to protect a suit of 
clothes from dust. The size and shape of the cloth, and 
the hole in the center through which the hook might 
pass, were evidence of the truth of this hypothesis. In 
other ways, the hypothesis was tried in thought and found 
to stand the test. The recipient of the present accepted 
this meaning as a fact, and (4) thus his purpose of finding 
the use of the thing was realized. 

From these illustrations, the steps in the making of a 
new means of control appear to be as follows : 

1. Experiencing a difficulty in realizing a purpose 

2. Denning the problem which must be solved in order 
to overcome the difficulty 

(a) by making hypotheses based upon analogy 

f in thought 

(&) by testing hypotheses I or 

1 in action 

3. Solving the problem 

(a) by making hypotheses based upon analogy 

f in thought 

(&) by testing hypotheses \ or 

[ in action 

4. Using the solution in realizing the purpose 

It is true that the process through which new means 
of control are made is often abbreviated, because two or 
more of the steps coalesce. A person may define the 
problem as soon as he has felt the first difficulty ; he may 
grasp the solution as soon as the problem has been defined. 
These abbreviated cases do not, however, concern us 



How New Means of Control Are Made 111 

here. The analysis of the process is made, as we shall 
learn definitely later, for the sake of finding how it can 
be controlled. So long as the process, having been 
started aright, runs effectively in forming a new means 
of control, there is no occasion for interfering with it. 
Direction is necessary only when there is a difficulty in 
the process, and whatever difficulty appears will be in 
taking one of the steps given above. A knowledge of all 
of the steps in the complete process is necessary as a basis 
for locating quickly and accurately whatever difficulty 
there may be, . and for finding what kind of assistance 
would be most effective. 

II 

The method of scientific investigation supports our conclusion 
with regard to the essential steps in making a new means of control. 

Logical method as expressed in the method of scientific 
investigation supports the conclusion that has been 
reached with regard to the essential steps in making a 
new means of control. Natural science is concerned 
with finding efficient causal connections, or, in other 
words, the uses of things. In creating new means of 
control, the method of science has produced remarkable 
results. The discovery of this logical method was noth- 
ing more than the discovery of the way in which man's 
mind has always worked in creating new means of con- 
trol. Knowing the way in which mind works, one is 
able to get better results by deliberately and precisely 
directing the steps necessary to successful investigation. 
The steps essential to scientific investigation, which have 
been found through the study of logic and used success- 
fully in the scientific laboratory, are the same as those 
given above. The scientist does not merely look about 



112 The Principles of Education 

for truths and pick them up when he sees them, as a 
botanist in field work adds rare plants to his collection. 
He must have some purpose in his investigation ; he must 
define a problem which marks a difficulty in attaining 
this purpose ; and he must solve this problem by making 
and testing hypotheses, which come to his mind as the 
result of analogies. The hypothesis that stands the test, 
that overcomes the difficulty, is accepted as truth, and 
the world learns that a new scientific fact has been 
discovered. 

Ill 

The process through which a new means of control is made gives 
emphasis to reason, whereas the process through which a new pur- 
pose is made gives emphasis to feeling. 

Are not the steps in the complete process of making a 
new means of control a mere amplification of the ones 
given in the previous chapter as essential to the making 
of a new purpose? Is not the value of the purpose felt 
in the first step, a means for its realization associated 
with it in the second and third, and the means used in 
the realization of the purpose in the last step? This is 
true; but the effects of the two processes are quite 
different. In the making of a new means of control, 
defining and solving the problem require nearly all of the 
individual's attention and put him in a reasoning state 
of mind. Thought and feeling are more or less exclusive ; 
they cannot both occupy the center of the stage at the 
same time. Thought chills feeling and feeling confuses 
thought. At the conclusion of the process of making a 
new means of control, the rational attitude is predominant, 
and reason gives emphasis to the instrumental nature of 
the new means that has been found. On the other hand, 



How New Means of Control Are Made 113 

in the steps for the making of a new purpose, feeling is 
predominant. Only a flash of association between means 
and end gives reason a very minor part to play. The 
feeling of value which is to be transferred from the end 
to the means occupies the center of the stage. The one 
process develops a new means of control, and the other 
adds value to this means of control after it has been 
developed. 

IV 

The most difficult steps in the process of making a new means of 
control are forming the hypothesis which defines the problem 
and forming the hypothesis which solves the problem. 

In the process of making a new means of control, the 
most difficult steps are finding, upon the basis of analogy, 
the hypotheses necessary to locate the problem and form 
the solution. The ability to use analogies William 
James calls sagacity, and says of it in connection with 
the forming of new means of scientific control created by 
Newton and Darwin : " The flash of similarity between 
an apple and the moon, between the rivalry for food in 
nature and the rivalry for man's selection, was too 
recondite to have occurred to any but exceptional minds.- 
Genius, then, . . . is identical with the possession of similar 
association to an extreme degree. Professor Bain says: 
'This I count the leading fact of genius. I consider it 
quite impossible to afford any explanation of intellectual 
originality except on the supposition of unusual energy 
on this point/ " 1 Every one has this ability, of course, 
to some degree. As James brings out, the genius differs 
from the ordinary man by having such ability to an 
extreme degree. 

1 James, William, The Principles of Psychology, Vol. II, p. 360. 



114 The Principles of Education 

That one individual, in a short life span, can acquire 
knowledge which has been developed only after centuries 
of thought by the most capable men of the race, is due to 
the fact that these difficult steps in acquiring knowledge 
are made easy for him. Forming the hypothesis on the 
basis of analogy is " going from the known to the un- 
known." Uses which the individual knows for things 
are thus made into new means of control, which were 
hitherto unknown to him. When once a successful hypoth- 
esis has been found, the basis from which it came through 
analogy can be pointed out easily and quickly to the 
learner. The bridge to the new knowledge is placed 
clearly and definitely before him. It may require the 
genius of a Newton to see the " similarity between an 
apple and the moon," and it may require the genius of a 
Darwin to see the " similarity between the rivalry for 
food in nature and the rivalry for man's selection," but 
after either hypothesis has been made, it is easy to indi- 
cate the analogy to the common man in such manner that 
he can see it. Since only hypotheses that have borne the 
test are pointed out to the learner, he is saved, moreover, 
the enormous amount of time and energy necessary to 
make and test unsuccessful hypotheses. 

V 

The use of a thing as a means of control constitutes the meaning of 
the thing. 

The use of a thing as a means of control constitutes 
the meaning of the thing. This is true whether the thing 
is a pen, a chair, a table ; or whether it is the word verte- 
brate, the statement of the law of gravitation, or an ac- 
count of the theory of evolution. Children's definitions 
emphasize the fact that use constitutes meaning, as, for 



How New Means of Control Are Made 115 

example : " nail is something to put things together ; " 
" pickle is something green to eat ; " " ring is what you 
wear on your finger ; " "a knife is to cut meat." x A 
thing has as many meanings as it has uses. To a child, 
water may appear both as something to drink and some- 
thing in which to take a bath. 

Dictionary definitions, representing the experience of 
mature persons, give further support to the fact that use 
constitutes meaning. According to the Standard Die- 
tionary, a pen is "an instrument for writing with a fluid 
ink ; formerly made of a quill, pointed and split, but now 
usually of metal and fitted to a holder; by extension, 
both pen and holder united." This definition includes 
both the function, or use, and the structure of the pen. 
The structure must be given in order to make the symbol 
of the thing more definite, for the thing involves both a 
symbol and a meaning. The structure gives also further 
uses, in so far as the individual knows uses for a " quill 
pointed and split," for " metal," and for " handle." 

An adult has, under normal conditions, acquired many 
more meanings for a pen than a child has acquired for it. 
A pen may be used to prop up a window, to pick dirt out 
of a crevice, to make a hole in a paper, to hold a loop in 
an electric wire so as to raise the light, to make a tapping 
sound in attracting some one's attention, to hold down a 
person's tongue in examining his throat for evidence of 
inflammation, etc. It is obvious that a dictionary could 
not practicably mention all of these uses. The diction- 
ary gives, therefore, the common use and indicates other 
uses, as well as the symbol, by describing the structure. 
The statement of structure carries with it as many mean- 
ings as the reader has found for that kind of structure. 
1 See Bagley, W. C, The Educative Process, p. 79. 



116 The Principles of Education 

When the meanings, or uses, of a thing are manifold 
and one does not stand out more prominently than others, 
the dictionary definition cannot be other than structural. 
To a boy, a stone is something to throw, but the important 
uses to which men put stones are so many that a diction- 
ary could not practicably record all of them. A stone 
is denned, therefore, as " a small piece of rock, as cobble 
or pebble." Rock is defined as " the consolidated ma- 
terial forming the crust of the earth or any representative 
portion of it," etc. In the terms of these definitions, the 
reader recognizes symbols together with uses which he 
has found for the things symbolized. The dictionary 
definition of water is . " a colorless limpid liquid compound 
of hydrogen and oxygen (H 2 0) in the proportion of two 
volumes of hydrogen to one of oxygen, or by weight 2 
parts of hydrogen to 16 of oxygen." Here again, " limpid 
liquid," " hydrogen," and " oxygen " convey the meaning 
of water only to the extent that the reader knows uses for 
such things. Liquid, hydrogen, and oxygen have mean- 
ing and can make the definition significant only in so far 
as the reader knows what they do, how they act, and, 
therefore, how they can be used in control. The experi- 
ments of a chemist in finding meanings for these sub- 
stances bear witness to this fact ; for he seeks to find how 
they act. 

A word is a physical thing ; it can be seen in a book or 
heard in conversation. The special meaning of a word 
is the special use people make of it as a symbol. Words 
bear meanings in definite form and their meanings are 
kept alive by frequent use. They are especially valuable 
in such matters as solving problems and communicating 
meanings, because they can be produced at will. The 
great superiority of man over the lower animals has been 



How New Means of Control Are Made 117 

attributed in a large measure to the advantage which the 
use of words has given to him. Because he can use such 
arbitrary signs of meanings, man has been called the 
symbol-making animal. 

VI 

There is a common stock of original meanings for things, and to 
these original meanings acquired meanings are added. 

Just as nature supplies the individual with an original 
stock of values, which are the bases for the making of other 
values, so nature supplies the individual with an original 
stock of meanings, which are the bases for the making of 
other meanings. The simplest meaning which a thing 
can have, and one which is common to all individuals, is 
that of something to be looked at, listened to, smelled, 
touched, or sensed in some other way. The thing is thus 
recognized as a means for giving certain sensations. A 
child and an adult, a savage and a civilized man, all 
recognize a watch as a thing to be looked at; nature 
gives this meaning to them all. But in addition to this, 
the watch may have other meanings that depend upon 
other uses to which it may be put. In addition to being 
a mere ornament, a mere object to be looked at, it is a 
means for telling time, a means for testing the acuteness 
of hearing, etc. 

Although a thing may have many meanings for a per- 
son, he is not necessarily conscious of them all when he 
looks at the thing. Very often only the simple meaning 
of something-to-be-looked-at is prominent in conscious- 
ness, while the relations of the thing to other purposes 
for which it has been found serviceable appear only as a 
fusion of appreciations transferred from the ends served, 
rather than as definite conscious plans of action. 



118 The Principles of Education 

VII 

A thing involves sensations, which are united by the meaning as 
sensations of the same thing. 

Besides the meaning, a thing involves sensations with 
which the meaning is intimately associated. An object 
appears in the distance silhouetted against the sky on 
the horizon. The observer says, " I see an automobile." 
Reduced to its lowest terms, what he really does see is a 
certain contrast of light and shade, which bears for him 
the meaning of automobile. If at night, a bright light 
appears in the distance, he may say again, "I see an 
automobile." What he really sees now is a bright light. 
Under other conditions, he may say that he hears or smells 
an automobile, when he hears only a sound and smells 
only an odor. That a person should recognize anything 
more than the sensation, is due to the fact that he has 
a ready-made meaning which he associates with this 
sensation. What is true of the experience of an auto- 
mobile is true of the experience of any other thing. 

Sensations are recognized as belonging to the same thing 
when one meaning is common to all of them. A certain 
form and color, the odor of gasoline, the chug of an 
engine, the noise of a horn, may each be the sensation 
symbol of an automobile. Because all of these sensa- 
tions have a common, meaning, they are recognized as 
belonging together as sensations of the same thing. 

As the result of Various meanings involved, what would 
otherwise be a confusion of sensations group themselves 
into various orderly units, each of which is recognized as 
a thing, such as a chair, steam radiator, piano, table, 
clock, doorknob, vase. As this paragraph is being writ- 
ten, the author has a complex of sound sensations. Some 



How New Means of Control Are Made 119 

of them group themselves as meaning a unitary thing 
called a piano ; others as meaning a heavy wagon passing 
on the street ; others, people talking ; and still others, a 
carpenter hammering nails. Various sounds are thus 
grouped together as sounds of the same thing, because 
they have the same meaning. In a factory, an inexperi- 
enced visitor may hear only a confusion of sounds, while 
the experienced machinist, accustomed to the factory, 
hears various machines or parts of machines. He has 
attached to the sounds certain meanings other than the 
common meaning of something to be heard. Likewise, 
when a person listens to others conversing in a language 
unfamiliar to him, he hears only a confusion of rapidly 
uttered sounds, because for him these sounds are not 
combined in meaningful groups. 

Whatever is distinguished as having a unitary meaning 
appears as a thing, no matter how manifold are the sensa- 
tions of it. A whole city, a house, or a brick in the house 
may be regarded as a thing when it involves one meaning. 
One grain of sand or the whole world, indeed, may each 
appear as a thing when it is considered to have a unitary 
meaning. 

VIII 

There is a mistaken popular belief that meaning is inherent in 
the thing. 

In the study of how new purposes are made, it was 
found that an acquired value becomes so intimately asso- 
ciated with a thing that a person seems to see the value 
as in inherent quality of the thing. 1 A person first finds 
honesty valuable because it is a means to valuable results, 
but later the value of the results becomes so intimately 
^ee pp. 72-74. 



120 The Principles of Education 

associated with the means that he seems to see intuitively 
that honesty is a thing worth while. After a person has 
acquired a new meaning for a thing by finding a new use 
for it, this meaning likewise becomes so intimately asso- 
ciated with the thing that he seems to see it immediately, 
to apprehend it intuitively, as inherent in the thing itself. 
As in the case of a word, we first associate intimately the 
meaning with the symbol and then seem to recognize this 
meaning immediately when the symbol appears. 

Owing to this fact, it is natural that in popular tradi- 
tion there should be not only the mistaken belief that 
value is an inherent quality of the thing, 1 but also the 
mistaken belief that meaning is inherent in the thing. 
The truth of the matter is that if the individual sees 
immediately in a thing any other meaning than would be 
recognized by a child or a savage, he sees this meaning in 
the thing because he himself has first put it there. Just 
as truly as he has put value into things by associating 
them through use with valuable purposes, he has .put 
meanings into things by finding new uses for them in the 
service of purposes. That the meaning of a thing is not 
inherent in it, but is derived from the use of the thing as 
a means of control, is a basal idea of modern pragmatic 
philosophy. 

1 See p. 89. 



How New Means of Control Are Made 121 



IX 

The steps recognized by natural science as essential to the making 
of a new response, which is the counterpart of a new meaning, are 
the physical parallels of the steps we have found essential to the 
making of a new meaning. According to natural science, the 
counterparts of meanings with which the individual is endowed by 
nature are inborn connections between stimuli and responses, and 
the appearance of acquired meaning as inherent in the thing is a 
manifestation of habit. 

Turning now to natural science, we shall find that it 
supports our conclusions about the making of a new means 
of control. A knowledge of the use, or meaning, of a 
thing is an accompaniment, according to natural science, 
of the strain sensations involved in the reaction to stimuli. 
As Professor Bagley says : " The use to which sensations 
are put determines their significance to the organism — 
determines, in other words, their meaning. A stimulus is 
presented to an infant and reaction follows. The stimu- 
lus becomes a sensation ; that is, the infant is ' conscious ' 
of it in a vague, incoherent fashion. A reaction follows 
upon the stimulus, but the initiation of the reaction is un- 
conscious; that is, it follows instinctively or reflexly upon 
the stimulus and would have taken place even though the 
stimulus had not entered consciousness as sensation. 
But this instinctive reaction is also reported to conscious- 
ness through the agency of the strain sensations arising 
in the tendons; the muscular adjustments to which the 
stimulus gave rise are made data of the child's conscious- 
ness and become fused with the original sensations which 
the stimulus aroused. Repetitions follow, and this asso- 
ciation between the sensation occasioned by the stimulus 
and the sensations occasioned by the instinctive adjust- 
ment to the stimulus becomes firmly fixed. Gradually 



122 The Principles of Education 

the stimulus loses its vague and incoherent character. It 
comes to ' mean ' a definite sort of response, the satisfac- 
tion of a definite need." 1 

If knowledge of use, or meaning, is the accompaniment 
of a response, knowledge of a new use, or meaning, is 
the accompaniment of a new response. In its account of 
the steps through which a new response is made, natural 
science supports our conclusions, for the steps it finds 
essential to the complete process of making a new response 
are the physical counterparts of the steps we have found 
essential to the complete process of making a new means of 
control. According to the materialistic explanation, the 
essential steps in the making of a new response are as 
follows : 

1. Some habitual response is checked in its function- 
ing. Because energy, according to natural law, follows 
the line of least resistance, nervous energy is diverted from 
the ready-made channel of habitual response to some 
new channel only when it meets an obstruction. When 
the habit of writing is checked by conflicting nervous 
activity due to stimuli caused by the unmarked paper 
over which the pen has passed, there is a check in the 
response of writing. 

2. Reaction is directed towards the several parts of 
the situation until checked by the disturbing element, 
which constitutes a part for which no adequate response 
has been acquired. When the main channel is blocked, 
nervous energy, following the line of least resistance, is 
diverted into those channels which are partly opened as 
a result of their connection with some of the stimuli in 
the situation. To the degree that situations have stimuli 
in common, they are similar ; and, as Professor Thorndike 

1 Bagley, W. C, The Educative Process, p. 68. 



How New Means of Control Are Made 123 

says, "To any situation for which neither nature nor 
nurture provides a response the response will be that 
which they provide for the situation most like it." l In 
the case of a very immature organism, the reaction that 
appears when an habitual response is checked may be 
quite random. This is due to the fact that the very im- 
mature organism has not developed reactions to closely 
similar situations. In the case of a more mature organism, 
however, the reactions tend to be directed towards various 
parts of the situation, until the disturbing element is met. 
This is true because the organism has acted in this way in 
similar situations. 

This kind of reaction is determined by natural law, 
because it is the simplest way leading to the reaction 
which overcomes the check, and the way, therefore, most 
frequently taken, according to the law of chance. As 
such channels increase in number, owing to many ex- 
periences of this kind, there is a greater predisposition of 
the organism to respond in this way to new situations. 
This kind of response runs smoothly, so long as the 
organism is adjusted easily to the several parts of the 
situation, but is checked abruptly when the disturbing 
element is met, for the disturbing element makes a part 
of the situation for which the organism has acquired no 
adequate response. In situations similar to that in which 
the response of writing was checked, reactions had been 
directed to the several parts of the situation, so nervous 
energy, flowing through channels partly opened by 
similarity of stimuli, found the same form of expression 
here. This manner of reaction ceased when the feed 
tube of the pen was reacted upon and a check was ex- 
perienced, because the condition of the feed tube formed 
1 Thorndike, E. L., The Elements of Psychology, p. 211. 



124 The Principles of Education 

a situation for which no appropriate response had been 
acquired. 

If nervous energy is diverted into a channel that leads 
at once to overcoming the check, the process is abbre- 
viated, and the directing of activity to various parts of 
the situation does not appear. We are making, however, 
an analysis of the complete process, where all of the steps 
stand out clearly. 

Tendencies to reaction through channels partly 
opened by similarity in stimuli may reach complete 
expression in outward act, or they may be affected by 
other incipient tendencies to activity, so that they do 
not reach such complete expression. 

3. Response is turned directly towards removing the 
check. Following the line of least resistance, nervous 
energy takes this form of expression, when reaction to the 
several parts of the situation is blocked by stimuli from 
some part for which no adequate response has been 
acquired. 

When one channel does not lead to the removal of the 
check, nervous energy flows on into others until the check 
is removed. The stimuli of the situation seed-in-straw- 
tube was connected with the response .blow-through- 
tube; the stimuli of dirt-in-bottle was connected with 
the response wash-bottle-with-water, etc. Owing to the 
fact that these channels are partly opened by similarity 
of stimuli in the situation dried-ink-in-feed-tube, nervous 
energy is now diverted into these channels, and, as a 
consequence, the organism will tend to blow through the 
tube, wash the tube with water, etc. Thus does the nerv- 
ous force go from one channel to another until the check 
is overcome. 

These tendencies to reaction, as in the case of the 



, 



How New Means of Control Are Made 125 

second step, may reach complete expression in outward 
act, or they may be affected by other tendencies to action 
so that they do not have such complete expression. 

4. The check is overcome and nervous energy follows 
the open channel of the response of writing. 

The mental steps which parallel these physical ones are 
as follows : 

1. An habitual response checked in its expression is, 
as we have learned, 1 the parallel of a purpose. 

2. Reaction directed towards the several parts of the 
situation until checked by the disturbing element, is the 
counterpart of denning the problem. When the disturb- 
ing element is met and, because no adequate response to 
this element has been acquired, the reaction is checked, a 
purpose appears in consciousness. This purpose marks a 
problem. When a purpose appeared in the first step of 
the process, it marked the problem very indefinitely, but 
the purpose now in consciousness as an accompaniment 
of a checked reaction towards only a part of the situation, 
makes the problem more definite, for this purpose lies 
immediately beyond the new means of control needed. 

Tendencies to reaction through channels partly opened 
by similarity of stimuli correspond to hypotheses based 
upon analogy. They are hypotheses because subject to 
check by later activity or tendencies to activity, if they 
are ineffective in bringing adjustment. If they reach com- 
plete expression in outward act, their effectiveness in 
bringing adjustment is tested in action; if they are 
affected by other incipient tendencies to activity so that 
they do not reach such complete expression, they are 
tested only in thought. 

3. When activity is turned directly towards removing 

1 See p. 93. 



126 The Principles of Education 

the check, it is obviously paralleled by consciousness of 
solving the problem ; or, in other words, of finding a new 
means of control for overcoming the difficulty. As in 
the case of the second step, this process is paralleled by 
the consciousness of hypotheses tested either in action or 
in thought. 

4. As the check is overcome and nervous energy fol- 
lows again the open channel of the habitual response, the 
individual is conscious of using a new means of control, 
which is the conscious parallel of the new response, in 
the service of a purpose, which is the conscious parallel 
of the habitual response checked in its expression. 

From the materialistic point of view, the basis of 
meanings with which nature endows the individual is 
found in the form of instincts, inborn connections between 
stimuli and responses. The simple meanings given by 
nature and common to all individuals are based upon 
instinctive responses, such as fixing the eyes upon or 
turning the ear towards some object. These are paral- 
leled by the consciousness that the object is something to 
be looked at, listened to, or used in some other instinctive 
way. 

Since there can be no stimuli without response, there 
can be no symbol without meaning. The symbol of a 
thing is the sensation which accompanies the immediate 
effect of the stimuli. This invariably passes on into 
reaction, which is the counterpart of meaning. 

The fact that meanings acquired for a thing become so 
closely associated with it that they seem to be recognized 
intuitively as inherent in the thing, is explained in the 
natural science account of perception. 

There is more to perception than passive impressibility by ex- 
ternal forces. Every act of perception is really an act of association. 



How New Means of Control Are Made 127 

What is felt depends not only upon how the afferent neurones are stimu- 
lated, but also upon what neurones they in turn arouse; not only upon 
what the external object is, but also upon (A) the past experiences 
and (B) the present tendencies of the individual who perceives it. x 

Every perception is an acquired perception. Perception may then 
be defined, in Mr. Sully's words, as that process by which the 
mind " supplements a sense-impression by an accompaniment or 
escort of revived sensations, the whole aggregate of actual and 
revived sensations being solidified or 'integrated' into the form of 
a percept, that is, an apparently immediate apprehension or cogni- 
tion of an object now present in a particular locality or region of 
space." 2 

This association of meaning so intimately with the thing 
as to make the meaning appear inherent in the thing is 
one of the manifestations of habit, through which " the 
neurones they in turn arouse " become so intimately 
connected with the neurones first stimulated that nervous 
energy flows without interruption from one to the other. 
As they become the direct unitary effect of the stimula- 
tion on the physical side, they appear to be the direct 
unitary effect of the presence of the object on the mental 
side. 

REFERENCES 

Dewey, J., How We Think, 1910, pp. 68-78. (Analyzes a complete 

act of thought.) 
Bagley, W. C, The Educative Process, 1907, pp. 66-82, 128-138. 

(Discusses the reading of meanings into sense impressions and 

the nature of judgment.) 
Moore, E. C, What is Education? 1915, pp. 30-58. (Presents in 

a simple way the nature of knowledge.) 
Colvin, S. S., The Learning Process, 1917, pp. 295-318. (Discusses 

the nature of the higher thought processes and the thought 

process in judgment and reasoning.) 

1 Thorndike, E. L., The Elements of Psychology, p. 226. The 
italics are mine. 

2 James, William, The Principles of Psychology, Vol. II, pp. 78-79. 



128 The Principles of Education 



PROBLEMS 

1. Select six utensils commonly used and state what problem 
each was invented to solve. 

2. What is essential to a real problem? 

3. To what steps in the making of a new means of control does 
Faraday refer when he says, "The world little knows how many 
of the thoughts and theories which have passed through the mind 
of a scientific investigator have been crushed in stillness and secrecy 
by his own severe criticism and adverse examination; that in the 
most successful instances not a tenth of the suggestions, the hopes, 
the wishes, the preliminary conclusions have been realized"? 

4. Give three instances in which you have made several hypoth- 
eses before locating a difficulty. 

5. Give three instances in which you have made several hypoth- 
eses before finding the one which solved your problem. 

6. Show in six instances that the hypotheses you have made 
either to define or to solve problems were the result of analogy. 

7. Give from your own experience an illustration of the acquiring 
of some means of control in which the four essential steps clearly 
appear. 

8. Criticize the doctrine of sense realism as advocated by Ratke 
and Comenius. 

9. State and criticize Herbart's idea of the nature of the mind. 
10. State and criticize Plato's theory of how ideas are acquired. 



CHAPTER VI 
PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT 

Personal development, which is the result of attaining pur- 
poses through means of control, takes place under the condition 
of interest or the condition of effort. Interest is felt when the 
process of self-realization runs smoothly, without conflict of pur- 
poses; effort is felt when there is a conflict of purposes. The 
condition of interest, when interest is intrinsic, is more favorable 
to personal development than is the condition of effort, with 
the exception that general regulative ideals such as duty~"and 
strength of will can be acquired only under the condition of 
effort. On the subjective side, personal development appears as 
character-building; on the objective side, it appears as world- 
building. Character-building consists in acquiring purposes 
together with ability to use means of control in realizing them. 
World-building consists in making meanings and purposes objec- 
tive and permanent by associating them so intimately with 
things of the world that they appear to be inherent in and to 
constitute the essential nature of these things. 



In order to understand personal development, we must under- 
stand (1) the nature of interest and of effort, (2) the nature of char- 
acter-building, and (3) the nature of world-building. 

The self -active process, which consists of realizing pur- 
poses through means of control, is continuous throughout 
life. No sooner has one purpose been carried out than 
another desired condition of the self excites in the indi- 
vidual pleasurable anticipation and becomes the object 
of his attention. This fact has led the poet to say, 

129 



130 The Principles of Education 

Hope springs eternal in the human breast ; 
Man never is, but always to be blest. 

Man is not led, however, by a mere will o' the wisp. 
Every worthy purpose realized brings some degree of 
blessing. It helps to develop in his experience the values 
which make life worth living and to give him more effec- 
tive control in attaining them; in other words, it pro- 
motes his personal development. Personal development 
is sometimes called self-realization, because, as purpose 
after purpose is attained, possible conditions of the self 
are made real. We have now come to the third larger 
problem in the study of the individual process ; namely, 
the problem of how purposes and means of control, which 
are both the factors and the products of the individual 
process, together constitute personal development. 

Several facts point to what we must study in order to 
get a better understanding of personal development. 
Both interest and effort mark conditions that affect it; 
for interest is felt when the process of realizing purposes 
runs smoothly, and effort is felt when the process runs 
with difficulty. As a person develops, his character is 
built, because the character of an individual depends upon 
his purposes and his ability to realize them. At the same 
time, the world as it appears to him is built, because pur- 
poses and meanings become so intimately associated with 
things of the world that they appear as inherent values 
and meanings of these things. The same development, 
therefore, looked at from the side of inner personality, 
the subjective side, appears as the building of character ; 
and looked at from the side of things of which the indi- 
vidual is conscious, the objective side, appears as the 
building of a world. In order to get a better understand- 



Personal Development 131 

ing of personal development, we must study, therefore, 
(1) the nature of interest and of effort, (2) the nature of 
character-building, and (3) the nature of world-building. 

II 

Interest originates in purposes and is carried over to the means 
of control which serve these purposes ; in other words, interest in a 
purpose is immediate and interest in a means of control is mediate. 

The source of interest is purpose. An individual can- 
not have a purpose unless he is directly, immediately 
interested in it. Interest may be carried over, however, 
from the purpose to the means of control which serves it. 
Interest in the means of control is mediate, indirect, just 
because it originates elsewhere and is carried over to the 
means. The individual would be indifferent to the means 
were it not connected with the purpose. Professor 
Dewey says : " Genuine interest in education is the 
accompaniment of the identification, through action, of 
the self with some object or idea, because of the necessity 
of that object or idea for the maintenance of self-expres- 
sion." l The " object or idea " may be either a purpose 
or a means of control through which this purpose is being 
realized. In the former case, the accompanying interest 
is called immediate; in the latter, it is called mediate. 

An illustration will make plainer the difference between 
immediate and mediate interest. A boy who desires to 
catch fish is interested immediately in the object of his 
desire, and may find it difficult to think of anything else, 
so strong is his interest. He identifies himself with the 
idea of catching fish by making it his purpose. His 
activity is directed towards realizing this future condi- 
tion of the self. When he digs in the garden for bait, 
1 Dewey, John, Interest as Related to Will, p. 12. 



132 The Principles of Education 

however, he is interested in digging not directly, but 
because it is a means for carrying out his purpose of fish- 
ing. The interest here is mediate, because digging is 
interesting not in itself, but because it serves the purpose 
of fishing, which is the source of the interest. 

An incident that happened when the author was teach- 
ing in a high school may be used for further illustration. 
A boy who had found mathematics very uninteresting and 
who, with patient resignation, had surrendered to mathe- 
matical difficulties, suddenly had a great, though tempo- 
rary, change of heart towards this subject. He even 
remained after school and asked the teacher to explain 
to him how to find the value of ?r to more than five 
decimal places. He said that he desired to get a more 
accurate figure than 3.14159, which was given in the 
textbook. As the teacher explained the process for find- 
ing the value of ir, the boy manifested much interest, and 
himself verified later each step in the calculation. Curi- 
ous as to what had brought about this change of heart, 
the teacher, upon inquiry, found that the boy wished to 
use the value of t in a contest for a bicycle. In a shop 
window was a bicycle with a cyclometer attached to the 
rear wheel, which was turned by an electric motor. The 
face of the cyclometer was concealed. The motor ran 
at a uniform rate for eight hours a day. A sign in the 
window said that the bicycle would be given to the person 
who would make the most nearly correct estimate of the 
number of miles that would be indicated by the cy- 
clometer at the end of eight days. The boy's purpose 
was to possess the bicycle. As he thought of this, he was 
thrilled with an immediate, spontaneous interest. But 
in order to carry out his purpose, it was necessary to make 
the most nearly correct estimate of the number of miles 



Personal Development 133 

to be indicated by the cyclometer. In order to do this, 
he must know the circumference of the wheel and the 
number of revolutions made in a unit of time. The num- 
ber of revolutions in a unit of time he found by counting 
the number of revolutions for many minutes and by then 
finding the average for one minute. Since he knew that 
the wheel was twenty-eight inches in diameter, he could 
find the circumference by using the value of t. Other 
boys were using 3.1416 and 3.14159 as the value of t. 
A more accurate value than this would be a material help 
in realizing his purpose. His interest in possessing the 
bicycle thus became mediated to various means, including 
the process of finding the value of w. One day, it may be 
added to make the story complete, he came into the 
schoolroom with a broad smile and exclaimed, " Teacher, 
I got the wheel ! " He had passed through the means of 
control to the realization of his purpose, and every step 
had held him with an interest which had its source in the 
end desired. 

Ill 

Mediate interests are of two kinds, intrinsic and extrinsic. In- 
trinsic interests are those which originate in purposes that give to 
the means its normal, distinctive meaning ; extrinsic interests are 
those which originate in purposes that do not give to the means its 
normal, distinctive meaning. If a person acquires a meaning for a 
thing or an ideal under the condition of extrinsic interest only, he 
will not by virtue of this experience make proper use of the thing 
when occasion calls for it. Ideals acquired with extrinsic interest 
are narrowly limited in influence. 

Interests in means, or mediate interests, are of two 
kinds, intrinsic and extrinsic. Intrinsic interests are 
those which originate in purposes that give to the means 
its normal, distinctive meaning; extrinsic interests are 



134 The Principles of Education 

those which originate in purposes that do not give to the 
means its normal, distinctive meaning. A girl who 
practices on the piano for the purpose of producing better 
music through improving her technique, has an intrinsic 
interest in the practice ; a girl who practices on the piano 
for the sake of getting a vacation trip, which has been 
promised her as a reward for practicing, has an extrinsic 
interest in the work. The distinctive meaning of piano 
practice is improvement in technique for the purpose of 
producing more satisfactory music, not for the purpose of 
securing a vacation trip. A pupil who studies rules of 
grammar in order to improve his understanding and 
expression of the language by a better control of language 
forms has an intrinsic interest in the rules ; if he studies 
them only for the sake of securing a high grade, he has 
an extrinsic interest. Rules of grammar get their normal, 
distinctive meaning from their use in the control of lan- 
guage forms, not from their use in securing high grades. 
A pupil who behaves well in school for the purpose of 
paying close attention to his work and of not interfering 
with the work of others has an intrinsic interest in his 
behavior, because the interest which attaches to it origi- 
nates in the purpose that gives good behavior under these 
conditions its normal, distinctive significance. If he 
behaves well in school for the purpose of avoiding arbi- 
trary punishment by the teacher, he has an extrinsic 
interest in his good acts. Good conduct derives its 
normal meaning, not from the fact that it is a means for 
avoiding punishment, but from the fact that it is a means 
for securing other values. 

Extrinsic interest, however, may lead to a problem 
that is denned by a purpose which marks the proper use 
of the thing, and may thus give, in a degree at least, a 



Personal Development 135 

normal meaning. If this were not the case, our schools 
would be very inefficient indeed, because so much of the 
interest in schools is extrinsic. A boy who knows that 
his standing in school will be lowered if he does not get 
proper verb forms in his compositions, will define his 
problem as that of getting correct verb forms. In solving 
this problem, he may acquire the rule that a verb should 
agree with its subject in person and number, and may 
thus, in a degree at least, understand the meaning of the 
rule. But is the use, and therefore the meaning which 
he gets for the rule, completely normal ? If asked why 
he learns the rule, he will reply, " For the sake of getting 
correct verb forms," and if asked why he desires to get 
correct verb forms, he will answer, " For the purpose of 
getting high grades." He does not connect the rule with 
its more remote normal purposes, such as correct and 
pleasing expression of thought and a better understanding 
of written and spoken language, which give the essential 
normal meaning to the correct use of verbs. 

Since under the condition of extrinsic interest a person 
uses a thing in an abnormal way and thereby acquires 
an abnormal meaning for it, he does not by virtue of this 
.experience make proper use of the thing later when occa- 
sion calls for it. How many pupils who have learned in 
school to be quiet merely for the sake of avoiding punish- 
ment and not for the sake of better study, are not quiet 
in a public library or lecture room? When punishment 
does not threaten them, they do not see the use for being 
quiet. The pupil who reads aloud only because the 
teacher calls upon him to do so, does not understand the 
true meaning of reading aloud and does not, therefore, as 
a result of this training, see the advantage of reading aloud 
in the family circle. If he had read aloud in school for 



136 The Principles of Education 

the purpose of informing or entertaining others gathered 
about him, he would as a result recognize the use of read- 
ing aloud in the family circle. Pupils who for the sake 
of securing good grades have learned to do neat work in 
writing exercises required in the English class, may do 
slovenly work in recording notes for their own use in the 
history or physics class, because they have acquired an 
abnormal meaning for neat writing and do not recognize 
it as a means to accuracy and clearness in expression. 

When a means of control acquired under the condition 
of extrinsic interest has been transformed into an ideal by 
receiving value from the abnormal end it has served, this 
ideal is narrowly limited in its influence. The fact that 
an ideal may have a wide influence by being carried from 
one field of activity to another, as when the ideal of 
neatness acquired in one kind of work leads a person to 
be neat in another kind of work, is clearly presented in 
Professor Bagley's discussion of formal discipline. 1 An 
ideal acquired under the condition of extrinsic interest 
does not, however, have this wide influence, because the 
situation which suggests it is peculiar to one kind of 
activity. Pupils who in a mathematics class have ac- 
quired_ an appreciation of accuracy by using it merely 
for the sake of satisfying an exacting teacher, are not 
likely by virtue of this experience to be influenced by this 
ideal in other fields of work, because the teacher is the 
factor in the situation which suggests the ideal. When 
this particular teacher is not present, they do not become 
conscious of the ideal. If they had acquired an apprecia- 
tion of accuracy because they had used it as a means for 
eliminating error and securing more valuable results, 
many situations would include factors suggesting to them 
1 Bagley, W. C, The Educative Process, pp. 210-217. 



Personal Development 137 

the ideal of accuracy. This truth is a matter of common 
knowledge in prison reform, in which it is recognized that 
proper ideals of behavior, if they are to function when the 
prisoner gains his freedom, must not be those peculiar to 
the prison, but must be developed through intimate 
association with purposes which give to these ideals their 
normal value in the life beyond the prison walls. 

IV 

The feeling of effort appears when two or more purposes tend to 
lead the individual to act in conflicting ways. It means, therefore, 
divided attention. Only under the condition of effort can the indi- 
vidual acquire such general regulative ideals as those of duty and 
strength of will. 

The feeling of effort appears when two or more purposes 
tend to lead an individual to act in conflicting ways. 
Since from the teleological point of view the only causes 
of activity are final causes, i.e. purposes, these purposes 
must be responsible for the friction manifested in effort. 
Not outward difficulty arising from the attainment of 
a single end, but the struggle of one purpose against 
another, is the direct cause of the feeling of effort. Since 
each purpose is a source of interest, effort is due to a con- 
flict of interests. Effort means, therefore, divided atten- 
tion. It indicates that the process of self -activity is not 
running smoothly. When the pupils in a class are en- 
gaged in a spelling match, interest may be dominant, 
because the purposes which give interest to the work are 
in the same line of activity ; but if the music of a circus 
parade near the schoolhouse is heard, the spelling match 
is continued with effort dominant. The activity of 
listening to the music and of seeing the parade, and the 
activity of carrying on the spelling match conflict ; both 



138 The Principles of Education 

processes cannot be realized at the same time. Atten- 
tion becomes divided between the two. If the spelling 
match is abandoned and if the pupils go to the street to 
see the parade and listen to the music, effort gives way to 
interest. If the parade passes by and is out of mind, the 
spelling match may proceed with interest. Again, a 
person experiences effort in studying when others are 
talking near him, because the desire to listen to the 
sounds of their voices and the desire to study tend to 
lead him to conflicting activities. He cannot do both at 
once ; each interferes with the other. 

The degree of effort felt is not dependent upon the 
amount of energy necessary to carry out the action. A 
girl may skip rope very energetically and feel no effort 
in doing so, whereas a much less amount of energy put 
into washing dishes while she can hear the shouts of other 
children at play, may bring a strong feeling of effort. 
A boy may with intense interest lie awake at night plan- 
ning how to build a hut and to make a boat for camp life ; 
but only with great effort can he, under otherwise favor- 
able conditions for study, plan the solution of an original 
problem in geometry just before an exciting ball game in 
which he is strongly interested. 

It may appear sometimes that the amount of energy 
expended in a single line of activity and the degree of 
effort felt are correlative. But here also effort is due to a 
conflict of purposes. When the individual has expended 
much energy, the purpose of checking his activity and 
resting comes to consciousness because he feels fatigue, 
which can be overcome by resting. He cannot, however, 
both act and cease to act at the same time ; his purposes 
conflict. If a girl desires to continue skipping rope in 
order to skip a larger number of times than a companion, 



Personal Development 139 

and simultaneously desires to stop in order to relieve her 
feeling of fatigue, she experiences effort in keeping up 
the activity. If at any moment the desire to stop or 
the desire to continue skipping rope takes complete pos- 
session of her, the feeling of effort will give way to the 
feeling of interest. In mental activity, the same holds 
true. When an individual feels fatigue or discouragement 
in any kind of study, the desire to stop appears. So long 
as this incipient purpose is present, the work is continued 
with effort ; but, if either the desire to stop or the purpose 
of continuing the study gets the right of way to the 
exclusion of the other, effort gives way to a feeling of 
interest. The blocking of the will by difficulty, however 
great it may be, does not engender the feeling of effort, 
unless out of this blocking arises a conflict of purposes. 

Since purposes are of different values, the conflict in 
the case of effort is between two desires, one of which, 
although strong, is felt to be less worthy than the other. 
Frequently the conflict is between immediate and remote 
ends, as, for example, in the case of a student in the 
library who has a tendency to listen to conversation in- 
truding upon his purpose of preparing for class discussion, 
or as in the case of a drunkard who experiences the con- 
flict between the desire to drink an intoxicant at once and 
the more worthy desire to get greater values in the more 
remote future by abstaining from drinking. 

When the realization of one purpose is checked by 
competition with another, other purposes may appear 
along the line of activity and add their authority to that 
of the ideal which is struggling to command conduct. 
When the pupil is tempted away from the spelling match 
by the circus music, the purposes of securing the approval 
of the teacher, victory in competition, higher grades, 



140 The Principles of Education 

freedom from punishment, etc., may appear. In addi- 
tion to more specific purposes along the line of activity, 
general ideals may be acquired to help out in just such 
situations as this. These general purposes are, as it were, 
" free lances " which come to the assistance of worthy 
purposes that are in danger of being overcome in competi- 
tion with less worthy ones. Chief of these general ideals 
is that of duty. Other " free lances " are indicated by 
such terms as firmness of character, pluck, strength of 
will, grit. Because such purposes come to the support 
of others which, without their help, would be abandoned 
for activities more immediately pleasing, they are some- 
times looked upon as disagreeable taskmasters. 

The individual can acquire such general purposes as 
that of duty only through the experience of effort. Since 
they are acquired ideals, they must be originally means 
of control and receive values from the ends which they 
serve. These ends may be freedom from social condemna- 
tion and the securing of social approval, or they may be 
also the intrinsic consequences which led society to give its 
approval to such ideals. But these ends must be acquired 
under the condition of effort. Unless the idea of duty 
is used to overcome a conflict of purposes, the individual 
does not even know what duty means. Because these 
general purposes can be developed only under the condition 
of effort, James says : 

Keep the faculty of effort alive in you by a little gratuitous exercise 
everyday. That is, be systematically ascetic or heroic in little un- 
necessary points, do every day or two something for no other reason 
than that you would rather not do it, so that when the hour of dire 
need draws nigh, it may find you not unnerved and untrained to 
stand the test. Asceticism of this sort is like the insurance which a 
man pays on his house and goods. The tax does him no good at the 
time, and possibly may never bring him a return. But if the fire does ' 



Personal Development 141 

come, his having paid it will be his salvation from ruin. So with the 
man who has daily inured himself to habits of concentrated attention, 
energetic volition, and self-denial in unnecessary things. He will 
stand like a tower when everything rocks around him, and when his 
softer fellow-mortals are winnowed like chaff in the blast. 1 

It would seem, however, that abundant opportunities for 
effort appear in the normal activities of everyday life, 
so that it is unnecessary for a person to go out of his way 
to find " gratuitous exercise." 

Effort, if persisted in long enough, will disappear, leav- 
ing the condition of interest. When purposes farther 
along the line of activity and general ideals, such as that 
of duty, are called to mind in support of some purpose 
in its struggle against a less worthy one, they give to this 
purpose which they support richer value, because this 
purpose, regarded now as a means of attaining the more 
remote ends of the act and of realizing such general ideals 
as that of duty, receives additional value from its inti- 
mate association with these ends. As a result, the worthy 
purpose having been made still more worthful gains so 
complete a command of action that the desire coming 
into conflict with it cannot intrude upon it again. The 
process of self -activity will then run smoothly and interest 
will be felt. 

V 

While interest and effort are of no value in themselves, the con- 
dition of interest is more favorable to personal development, with 
the exception that such regulative ideals as duty and strength of will 
can be acquired only under the condition of effort. 

Neither interest nor effort is of any value in itself; 
they merely indicate whether the self-active process is 
1 James, William, The Principles of Psychology, Vol. I, p. 126. 



142 The Principles of Education 

running smoothly or with difficulty. Whether smooth 
running or conflict is desirable depends upon the char- 
acter of the realization at the time. A person may be 
interested in things that are bad as well as in things that 
are good. The matter of prime importance is the attain- 
ing of personal development through the realization of 
the most worthful purposes. Smooth running when the 
purposes are unworthy, or when the individual avoids 
effort by abandoning half-finished tasks because allure- 
ments to other activities appear, is undesirable. If in- 
terest marks concentration for valuable achievement, it 
is desirable. If effort means unnecessary checking of 
activity in the service of worthy purposes, if it means 
tasks that are mere tasks, it is bad. Interest and effort 
mark conditions similar to those of peace and war. Peace 
in a nation may be good under some circumstances and 
•bad under others ; war may be just as well as unjust. 

The condition of effort is necessary for the development 
of certain general ideals such as duty and strength of will, 
but the condition of interest is necessary for the best 
development through the realization of other ideals. 
When the individual feels effort in the study of history 
and geography, he may be developing general ethical 
ideals which will steady him in his path of self-realization 
and thereby add fiber to his moral nature, but he is not 
making the progress in history and geography that he 
would make if he felt interest in the work. As Goethe 
says, " Talent is developed in quietude ; character in 
the turmoil of the world." A talent is developed better 
in quietude, because in such conditions its development 
is less liable to be hindered by the appearance of distract- 
ing desires. On the other hand, the multifarious interests 
of the world involve many distracting desires that may 



Personal Development 143 

be overcome, and thus furnish the conditions necessary 
for the development of regulative ideals, which are essen- 
tial to strength of character. 

When effort is largely predominant in the life of an 
individual, he misses the joy of living which marks the 
pathway of interest. Pleasurable satisfaction comes from 
the attainment of ideals; but he is concerned, in a 
large measure, with overcoming conflict between ideals. 
As a consequence, the effort-burdened individual is liable 
to become " dull, stubborn, unalert." This truth is 
recognized in the saying, " All work and no play makes 
Jack a dull boy." 

VI 

Character-building, which is personal development viewed from 
the subjective side, consists in acquiring purposes together with 
the ability to use means of control in realizing them. 

In the process of personal development, character is 
built. Character, as has been said, is personal develop- 
ment viewed from the side of inner personality, the sub- 
jective side. It marks the potentialities of the individual 
for social action ; or, in other words, what he can be ex- 
pected to do. What he can be expected to do depends 
upon his purposes and means of control. The essentials 
of good character are, therefore, both good purposes and 
a command of the means of realizing them. Evil pur- 
poses make the criminal, who is often very capable in 
control, but may use this ability to deprive men unjustly 
of their property and even of their lives. Inefficient 
control coupled with good purposes makes the inefficient 
man of good intentions, who also is a detriment to social 
welfare. The well-meaning but inefficient doctor may 
cause unnecessary suffering and even death. The well- 



144 The Principles of Education 

meaning but inefficient lawyer may not secure justice 
for his client. The well-meaning but inefficient philan- 
thropist may increase the very evils he seeks to destroy. 

Day by day, the individual builds his character as he 
acquires new purposes and new means of control through 
the self-active process. They stand ready with full 
authority to command and guide his activity, whenever 
their services are needed. The fact that the values of 
purposes, when once acquired, are appreciated immedi- 
ately 1 marks the truth of Aristotle's statement that the 
good is what appears to be such to the good man. 
Through the use of means in the service of worthy ends 
and the transfer of values to these means so as to make 
them ideals, the web of values has been woven in the 
experience of the good man so that he appreciates the 
good immediately. 

The fact that acquired meanings, after they have been 
worked out consciously in solving problems arising from 
difficulties in action, are recognized immediately 2 marks 
the truth of James's words, 3 when he says : "As we become 
permanent drunkards by so many separate drinks, so 
we become saints in the moral, and authorities and 
experts in the practical and scientific spheres, by so many 
separate acts and hours of work. Let no youth have any 
anxiety about the upshot of his education, whatever the 
line of it may be. If he keep faithfully busy each hour 
of the working-day, he may safely leave the final result 
to itself. He can with perfect certainty count on waking 
up some fine morning, to find himself one of the compe- 
tent ones of his generation, in whatever pursuit he may 
have singled out. Silently, between all the details of his 
business, the power of judging in all that class of matter 
1 See pp. 70-72. 2 See p. 120. 3 James, opus cit., p. 127. 



Personal Development 145 

will have built itself up within him as a possession that 
will never pass away." 

Both purposes and means of control must be used 
normally in building and maintaining an efficient char- 
acter. The sentimentalist uses his purposes merely as 
means to pleasurable feeling and abandons them as soon 
as this pleasure has been enjoyed. He may feel satis- 
faction in weeping over human suffering in the theater, 
but does nothing to relieve suffering to which the play 
calls his attention in the life about him. He may enjoy 
the excitement of some stirring novel of sacrifice for the 
sake of an ideal, but does not lift a finger to realize in 
his own life values for which the novel has aroused his 
emotions. He may feel enthusiastic in listening to an 
eloquent appeal for extension of the benefits of his reli- 
gion to the heathen, but does not even put an offering on 
the contribution plate. As a result, he weakens his 
purposes; he strips them of authority to command his 
action ; he becomes blase. Pleasure-seeking through the 
abnormal use of purposes, if persisted in, defeats itself. 
Verily, purposes are kept alive only through activity 
directed to the realization of them as ends. On the other 
hand, the mere theorist uses means of control abnormally 
by treating them as ends in themselves. His desire is only 
to get a knowledge of them, not to use them in the service 
of those purposes upon which their meanings depend and 
in the realizing of which their truth is tested. As a result, 
he weakens his control ; he gets perverted meanings ; he 
becomes unpractical. Mere knowledge-seeking tends to 
defeat itself. Popular judgment made no mistake when, 
in an age in which mere knowledge was sought as the aim 
of education, it attached to the word " professor " the 
stigma of unpracticality. 



146 The Principles of Education 

VII 

World-building, which is personal development viewed from the 
objective side, consists in making objective and permanent the 
meanings and purposes acquired in personal development, by 
associating these meanings and purposes so intimately with things 
of the world that they appear to be inherent in these things and 
to constitute the essential nature of them. 

In the process of personal development, the individual 
builds the world in which he consciously lives, the world 
as he knows and appreciates it. As Davidson says: 
"That the human being will, under any circumstances, 
build up some kind of a world is clear. To a large extent 
he does so unconsciously, and without any effort. But 
there are worlds and worlds. The world of the street 
waif who picks pockets and goes to the reformatory or 
jail is very different from the world of the great scien- 
tist, philosopher, artist, or statesman." 1 

Things hold for us the meanings which, in our personal 
development, we acquire and associate with them. In 
the study of how means of control are made, we found 
that uses, or meanings, become so intimately associated 
with the things involved that these uses, or meanings, 
appear as inherent in the things. When an individual 
looks at a thing, he. seems to see directly the meaning of 
it. A book appears as something to be read, a watch as 
something with which to tell the time, a rule of grammar 
as something to make, in a particular manner, the expres- 
sion of language more exact and intelligible. In this 
way, as the individual finds new uses for things, he builds 
their meanings, which constitute their essential nature. 
This fact points to the truth in Davidson's statement that 

1 Davidson, Thomas, Education as World-Building, Educational 
Review, Vol. XX, p. 329. 



Personal Development 147 

" every world is a means of satisfying desire and derives 
all the significance it possesses from such desire." 1 

Things not only hold meanings; they hold also the 
purposes which, in our personal development, we acquire 
and associate with them. As means of control take on 
ideal values from the ends they serve, the meanings of 
the things involved gain an immediate value which trans- 
forms these meanings into purposes. Thus, when a cup 
of chocolate is placed before a person at a social gather- 
ing, he may not merely recognize its meaning as something 
to be drunk, but may have at once the purpose of drink- 
ing it. When an individual sees a book, he may not only 
recognize it as something to be read; but the sight of 
the book, if more authoritative desires do not prevent, 
may carry with it the purpose of reading. As soon as 
he sees the book, he may say " I desire to read it." 

Things make up the world, and because things are the 
bearers of meanings and purposes acquired in personal 
development, the world which a person knows and ap- 
preciates is the objective record of his own development. 
He sees meanings and values in his world because he has 
first put them there. " All things are common to him 
who sees with common eyes." If he has put only com- 
mon meanings and values into things, he can see in them 
only that which is common. Many soldiers in Napo- 
leon's army may have seen in the pyramids of Egypt only 
huge piles of stone, but Napoleon is said to have exclaimed, 
" Soldiers, from yonder pyramids forty centuries look 
down upon you! " He saw this because he had built in 
his world the meanings and values of the wonderful 
civilization that once crowned the valley of the Nile, 
meanings and values of which the pyramids are enduring 
1 Davidson, Thomas, opus cit., p. 332. 



148 The Principles of Education 

symbols. Alluding to Moses and the burning bush, Mrs. 
Browning says : 

Earth's crammed with heaven, 

And every common bush afire with God ; 

But only he who sees takes off his shoes. 1 

How is it possible for a person to see such things? Cer- 
tainly not by merely opening his eyes and looking. Out 
of his daily activities in realizing purposes through means 
of control, he must create the halos which make common 
objects divinely significant. The fiat of his will when he 
accepts a meaning as true or a purpose as valuable is 
verily the fiat of a creator making the heavens and the 
earth and the things that in them dwell. These things 
are more than mere objects of sensation ; their inner 
essential natures are their meanings and values, which the 
individual creates in the process of personal development. 

The world which an individual knows includes both 
matter and mind. Reduced to its lowest terms, matter 
is a permanent possibility of sensation common to all 
people. This is because every person, whether child or 
adult, savage or civilized man, is endowed by nature with 
the common meaning that matter is something to be looked 
at, or felt, or sensed in some other way. He must have 
this meaning in order to be conscious of matter at all. 
Then, as he develops new uses for material things, he 
acquires new meanings for them. 

The minds of other persons are never known directly, 
but only through the medium of matter. The price which 
every person must pay for his individuality is that he can 
never know directly the mind of any one else. He is 
immediately conscious of other bodies, but the existence 
1 Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, Aurora Leigh, Bk. III. 



Personal Development 149 

of other minds is only an assumption, an hypothesis that 
works in the control of his experience. He must assume 
the existence of other minds in order to realize his ideals 
of sympathy and love, and in order to understand and 
control the activities of others. By accepting this hy- 
pothesis and acting upon it, he makes it into a reality in 
his world. So real does this hypothesis become that he 
may have to take a second thought in order to convince 
himself that he does not know other minds directly. 

Because new means of control are hypotheses that 
work, that bear the test of action, and because these hypoth- 
eses are derived through analogy from other means of 
control, 1 the meanings of the world as we know them form 
a great web of analogies. Confronted by multifarious 
active things, — flying birds, rippling brooks, rolling 
stones, moving sun, moon, and stars, — primitive man 
naturally attempted to explain the activities of these 
things through analogy with his inner experience of the 
causes of his own activity. This led to his belief in 
animism ; he attributed to all objects minds, spirits, like 
his own. , He believed that he could control natural 
objects by propitiating, by " getting on the good side of," 
these spirits. Regarding certain classes of objects as 
inanimate, civilized man eliminated thought and feeling 
from the hypothesis which, under the assumption of 
animism, had been used to explain the changes in these 
objects. This left in the hypothesis only blind will, or 
energy, which was considered the "efficient " cause of 
changing phenomena. A person cannot directly see force, 
or cause, in changing phenomena of the material world. 
Just as truly as he reads into other persons his own 
thoughts and feelings in order to understand their con- 

1 See p. 110. 



150 The Principles of Education 

duct, he reads into inanimate objects his own inner ex- 
perience of energy stripped of thought and feeling, in 
order to explain the changes in these objects. This fact 
is evident whether he accounts for the phenomena of two 
freight cars bumping together or of the activities of atoms 
and molecules. That the meanings of the world as we 
know them form a great web of analogies appears, there- 
fore, even in the derivation of the scientific concept of 
material cause from analogy with inner experience. 

When matter was greatly enriched through the sciences, 
each new science, guided by analogy, borrowed its hy- 
potheses, and therefore its truths, from other scientific 
truths previously established. The matter and motion 
of physics became thus a basis for hypotheses which 
explain chemical changes; the truths of chemistry be- 
came a basis for hypotheses which explain biological 
changes; and the truths of biology became a basis for 
hypotheses which, according to psychology, explain 
mental changes. 

Things become more closely related as their meanings 
develop, because they become organized with reference to 
purposes which they are found to serve. The individual 
thus organizes his world in a large degree without deliber- 
ately seeking to do so, but he carries this organization 
much further because he has an inborn desire to do so. 
This inborn desire appears as curiosity, pure scientific 
interest, and philosophic wonder. It is strengthened by 
acquired values. For the same reason that a mechanic 
who uses many tools can do more effective work by ar- 
ranging his tools in an orderly way, so the individual, by 
organizing his means of control in general, can more 
effectively realize purposes. This fact gives to the organ- 
izing of means of control an added value. Thus through 



Personal Development 151 

both native and acquired desire, the individual longs for 
unity. The strange object, that which has not yet been 
given a place in the unified world as he knows it, excites 
his curiosity and troubles him until he has classified it 
and thereby assigned it a place. Even in the realm of 
feeling, this desire for order appears. He combines 
sounds into rhythm and melody, colors into harmony, and 
his art is satisfactory only when it has unity. In the 
special sciences, he finds principles which organize mean- 
ings by grouping them in classes ; in philosophy, he seeks 
principles which will bring all reality into a unified whole. 
With the progress of personal development, the world 
which the individual knows and appreciates becomes a 
permanent, objective organization of the meanings and 
purposes which guide his activity. It is an objective 
system of plans of action in which the relative values of 
these plans of action, as he appreciates them, are apparent. 
As Davidson says, "The evolution of the individual is 
the evolution of an ordered world in his consciousness." l 



VIII 

From the materialistic point of view, the development of reac- 
tions to environment is the physical counterpart of personal de- 
velopment. In its account of the process through which reactions 
are developed, natural science gives authority to the fact that 
the condition of intrinsic interest is more favorable to personal 
development than is the condition of effort, excepting for the 
acquiring of general regulative ideals such as duty, and it gives 
authority also to the fact that, in the process of personal develop- 
ment, the character of the individual and the world of which he is 
conscious, are built. 

Let us now view our conclusions in the light of natural 
science. The physical counterpart of the process of per- 

1 Davidson, Thomas, opus cit., p. 331. 



152 The Principles of Education 

sonal development is, according to natural science, the 
process of progressive adjustment of the psychophysical 
organism to the environment, through stimuli and re- 
sponses. As Munsterberg says, in writing from the 
natural science point of view, " The development of our 
reactions is our life history." In explaining the develop- 
ment of reactions, natural science supports the conclu- 
sions reached above with regard to the nature of interest 
and of effort, the nature of character-building, and the 
nature of world-building. 

Interest is the feeling side of attention ; when we feel 
an interest in a thing, we are attending to it. Since 
interest and attention are thus inseparable, the materialistic 
explanation of the changes in the nervous system ac- 
companying attention must be also the explanation of 
the changes in the nervous system accompanying interest. 
With regard to the physical conditions that parallel 
attention, Munsterberg says: "Our nervous system is 
organized in such a way that if we do a certain thing all 
the opposite actions are inhibited. The channels of motor 
discharge are somehow blocked for them. If it were not 
so, attention would not be possible. Now we only have 
to come back to our previous claim, that those ideas 
become vivid which find the ways for action open and 
those ideas are suppressed which find the channels of 
activity closed. The whole process of attention is then ex- 
plained." x Interest then appears when there is a single 
channel open for activity. Since this open channel is 
marked on the side of consciousness by a purpose, the 
source of interest must appear, from the teleological point 
of view, to be in a purpose. 

Extrinsic interest, as we have learned, marks reactions 
1 Munsterberg, Hugo, Psychology and the Teacher, p. 159. 



Personal Development 153 

to abnormal situations, whereas intrinsic interest marks 
reactions to normal situations. Since habit is a connec- 
tion between specific stimuli and response, an habitual 
reaction formed in response to the stimuli of one situation 
is not called forth by the stimuli of a different situation. 
In the degree, then, that the abnormal situation is differ- 
ent from the normal one, the organism that has acquired 
its reactions under abnormal conditions will be, to that 
extent, unresponsive to the situations to which these 
reactions normally belong. This fact supports the state- 
ment that the person who has learned a thing only under 
the condition of extrinsic rather than intrinsic interest, 
does not make proper use of the thing when occasion calls 
for it. 

Effort appears when the organism tends to react in 
conflicting ways. Effort is a condition of divided atten- 
tion, and since attention is in the line of activity, divided 
attention must mean divided, or conflicting, activity. In 
the case of fatigue, the conflict may be merely between a 
reaction and its inhibition, for "any fatigue sensation works 
as a stimulus for the opposite reaction/' 1 Owing to the 
fact that " our nervous system grows to the modes in 
which it has been exercised," 2 the successful reaction 
following a conflict of responses opens a single way for 
later nervous discharges under that situation, so that in 
time the physical conditions of effort tend to give way to 
the physical conditions of interest. 

The condition of interest is more favorable to progres- 
sive adjustment of the organism to the environment, 
because, under this condition, the process of adjustment is 
not interrupted by a conflict of activities. Since personal 

1 Miinsterberg, Hugo, Psychology and the Teacher, p. 161. 

2 James, William, The Principles of Psychology, Vol. I, p. 112. 



154 The Principles of Education 

development is the teleological counterpart of this adjust- 
ment, the condition of interest is better for personal 
development. There is one exception, however. The 
responses which assist in overcoming conflicts of activi- 
ties, and thereby are useful in adjustment, can be de- 
veloped only under conditions in which such conflicts 
appear. From the teleological side, this means that such 
ideals as duty can be developed only under conditions of 
effort. 

In the progressive adjustment of the organism to en- 
vironment, the physical counterpart of personal develop- 
ment, character is built. A quotation from James's 
Principles of Psychology will serve to show this. 

The physiological study of mental conditions is thus the most 
powerful ally of hortatory ethics. The hell to be endured hereafter, 
of which theology tells, is no worse than the hell we make for our- 
selves in this world by habitually fashioning our characters in the 
wrong way. Could the young but realize how soon they will become 
mere walking bundles of habits, they would give more heed to their 
conduct while in the plastic stage. We are spinning our own fates, 
good or evil, and never to be undone. Every smallest stroke of 
virtue or of vice leaves its never so little scar. The drunken Rip 
Van Winkle, in Jefferson's play, excuses himself for every fresh 
dereliction by saying, ' I won't count this time ! ' Well ! he may 
not count it, and a kind Heaven may not count it ; but it is being 
counted none the less. Down among his nerve-cells and fibres, the 
molecules are counting it, registering and storing it up to be used 
against him when the next temptation comes. Nothing we ever do 
is, in strict scientific literalness, wiped out. 1 

Since habits are the physical counterparts, under proper 
conditions, of both purposes and means of control, the 
fact that the building of a good character is the acquiring 
of habits which harmoniously adjust the organism to the 
1 James, William, The Principles of Psychology, Vol. I, p. 127. 






Personal Development 155 

environment means on the teleological side that the build- 
ing of a good character is the acquiring of good purposes 
and the ability to use means of control effectively in 
realizing them. N 

The connecting of habitual responses with stimuli in 
the process of the adjusting of the organism to the en- 
vironment is the physical parallel of world-building. 
Since sensation parallels a stimulus and since meaning 
and purpose are counterparts of the habitual response, 
the intimate connection of stimulus and response cor- 
responds to the reading of meaning and purpose into 
sense impression. This constitutes the developing of the 
meanings and values of things, which are the objects of 
sensation, and is, therefore, world-building. The organ- 
izing of the world is the mental counterpart of organizing 
habits of response. 

The time when fundamental acquired reactions are 
being formed, natural science calls the period of plasticity, 
the period when physical changes in the brain and nervous 
system are most easily made. From the teleological point 
of view, this appears as the time when the foundation of 
the individual's character and world are being laid, when 
those meanings are being developed which become the 
bases through analogy of other meanings, and when those 
purposes are being developed which, in turn, give values 
to other purposes. In time, these meanings and pur- 
poses are held fast in experience by threads of connection 
running through the whole fabric of the individual's 
character and world. At the beginning, their variation 
is easy ; but, with the growth of experience, every means 
and every purpose becomes bound in place by its manifold 
connections with a multiplicity of others. 



156 The Principles of Education 

REFERENCES 

Dewey, J., Interest as Related to Will, 1895, pp. 5-26. (Explains the 
nature of interest.) 

Dewey, J., Moral Principles in Education, 1909, pp. 1-17, 47-58. 
(Explains from the point of view of education the nature of a good 
character.) 

Eliot, C. W., Education for Efficiency, 1909, pp. 33-55. (Gives a 
modern statement of the nature of culture.) 

Moore, E. C, What is Education? 1915, pp. 104-141. (Shows that 
as the individual develops he builds a world in his experience.) 

Davidson, T., Education as World-Building, Educational Review, 
Vol. XX, pp. 325-345. (Shows that as the individual develops 
he builds a world in his experience.) 

James, W., The Principles of Psychology, 1904, Vol. I, Ch. IV. (Dis- 
cusses individual development as habit formation. Each student 
should read this chapter.) 

Pyle, W. H., The Outlines of Educational Psychology, 1911, pp. 164- 
181. (Discusses moral training from the point of view of psy- 
chology.) 

PROBLEMS 

1. Can you make a person attend to anything in which he is not 
interested ? Explain. 

2. Give three instances in which you were actuated by immediate 
interest and three instances in which you were actuated by mediate 
interest. 

3. Give three instances in which you have acted with extrinsic 
interest and three instances in which you have acted with intrinsic 
interest. 

4. Give three instances in which you have experienced effort 
and indicate the conflicting purposes in each. 

5. Give three instances in your experience in which the ideal 
of duty appeared in a conflict of purposes and assisted a worthy pur- 
pose to overcome an unworthy one. 

6. Must school work be easy in order to be interesting to the 
pupils? Explain. 

7. In personal development what is the nature and importance 
of the feeling of need? 



Personal Development 157 

8. A recent book says with regard to salesmanship : "The argu- 
ment that really sells goods is the argument that is based specifically 
upon the needs of the man you are addressing; the argument that 
answers the objections to your product that exist in his mind; the 
argument that offers a satisfactory supply for some demand he 
desires to fill." Do you believe that this statement is true? Why? 

9. What is the value of corporal punishment as a method of moral 
control ? 

10. Is the library regulation requiring silence justifiable, or should 
noise be permitted so that students may develop greater powers of 
concentration in study? Explain. 

11. a. What is the most prominent argument made to show that 
effort should predominate in school work? b. What answer would 
you make to this argument? 

12. a. Criticize the popular idea of what constitutes a good moral 
character, b. Is this popular idea changing? 

13. What is culture? 

14. How can strong initiative be cultivated? 

15. What is the nature of individuality? 

16. Show that since material objects are permanent possibilities 
of sensation, they become permanent objective memoranda of one's 
purposes and means of control, and thereby guide one's daily activi- 
ties in the home, the street, the office, the shop, etc. 

17. Which one normally experiences a richer world, the boy of 
sixteen or the man of sixty? Explain. 

18. What is the relation between the world and the individual? 

19. Are the making of purposes and the making of means of con- 
trol two distinct processes or two aspects of one process? Explain. 



THE SOCIAL PROCESS 



CHAPTER VII 
ANALYSIS OF THE SOCIAL PROCESS 

Society furnishes two classes of patterns, one to guide the pro- 
cess through which the individual acquires new purposes, and the 
other to guide the process through which he acquires new means 
of control. These patterns are developed under social direction. 
The best patterns for purposes are history and the fine arts; 
the best patterns for means of control are the sciences. The 
belief that the most important use of history, the fine arts, and 
the sciences is to give refined pleasure to the individual during his 
leisure time, is due to a short-sighted view that does not disclose 
their essential functions. 

I 

In the determination of what purposes and what means of control 
may be acquired by the individual, society furnishes, through the 
medium of matter, two kinds of patterns, because there are two pro- 
cesses to be guided. 

In the study of human development, we come now to 
the social factor. The individual process has been ex- 
plained, but this explanation does not tell the whole story 
of human development. It accounts for how the indi- 
vidual acquires purposes and means of control, but it 
does not account for what purposes and means of control 
he acquires. The latter is determined by society; for, 
as we have learned, the individual is the agent through 
whom social purposes and ideas are expressed. 1 

Society guides the process of individual development 
by furnishing so-called patterns. These patterns are the 

1 See pp. 30-31. 
161 



162 The Principles of Education 

factors of the social process; they guide individuals not 
only to the stage of development attained by the race, 
but also to the experience of new purposes and new means 
of control added year by year to the social stock. The 
scientific investigator, for example, acquires under social 
guidance not only a knowledge of what has been ac- 
complished in his field of study together with an appre- 
ciative understanding of the unsolved problems, but 
acquires also under social guidance a scientific method 
which enables him, on the basis of this knowledge, to 
make further progress. The problem of this chapter 
is to differentiate, through analysis of the social process, 
these social factors, or patterns, which guide human 
development. 

Society cannot give directly to the individual new 
purposes and means of control; it can make him con- 
scious of them only by guiding the processes through 
which new purposes and new means of control are ac- 
quired. 1 For guiding this process, there must be two 
kinds of social patterns, that which guides the process 
through which new purposes are acquired, and that which 
guides the process through which new means of control 
are acquired. The former guides the individual (1) to 
feel the value of some purpose, (2) to associate inti- 
mately with it a means of control, and (3) to use this 
means in realizing the purpose; the latter guides him 
(1) to experience a purpose in the carrying out of which 
he meets a difficulty, (2) to define the problem through 
making and testing an hypothesis, (3) to solve the problem 
through making and testing an hypothesis, and (4) to 
use the solution in carrying out the purpose. 

Under ordinary conditions, the individual is more in 
1 See Chs. IV and V. 



Analysis of the Social Process 163 

need of guidance through some steps than through others. 
In acquiring new purposes, he needs guidance especially 
for the first two steps. If the individual is put into a 
situation in which he feels strongly a purpose and asso- 
ciates intimately with it a means for its realization, he 
usually passes on, without further assistance, through the 
third step, that of acting. Society may give him special 
assistance in the third step, however, by making the 
situation in which he is placed such that he is not dis- 
tracted by conflicting purposes and can, therefore, act 
more easily. In acquiring new means of control, the 
individual is more in need of guidance for the second and 
third steps. Purposes which he has acquired command 
him to act whenever they appear in consciousness; a 
demand for action is an essential characteristic of every 
purpose. If difficulties stand in the way of realizing these 
purposes, guidance is needed especially in defining and 
solving the problem. The fourth step, that of using the 
solution, usually takes care of itself. But here, also, 
society may assist by making the way for action easy. 
Because of these facts, the most prominent social guid- 
ance in the making of new purposes is that which leads 
the individual to associate intimately means of control 
with values, and the most prominent social guidance in 
the making of new means of control is that which leads 
the individual to define and solve problems. 

Illustrations which have been given in the discussion 
of how new purposes and new means of control are ac- 
quired, reveal in a greater or less degree the guiding 
influence of the social factor ; but, in these cases, atten- 
tion was directed to the individual side. Several illus- 
trations may profitably be given here with emphasis 
upon the social side. 



164 The Principles of Education 

Let us take an instance in which a child is guided by 
social influence to acquire the purpose of using polite 
table manners. (1) His elders, according to social custom, 
gather about the table at meal time. In this situation, he 
becomes conscious of the purpose of eating with them. 

(2) The admonition of his elders makes him associate 
polite table manners with his purpose as a means of realiz- 
ing it ; or perhaps the remembrance of having been sent 
away from the table the day before when he behaved 
badly, may bring to his mind the same association. 

(3) His elders give him opportunity to use good manners 
by placing him at the table, and make proper behavior 
easy for him by acting in exemplary ways and by putting 
the cake beyond his reach. If his elders set bad examples 
and if the temptation to seize the cake is not removed, the 
child may not be able to act properly. Under ordinary 
conditions, the third step would follow the other two 
without anything unusual being done to make good 
behavior easy. 

Social influence may guide a youth employed in an 
office or factory toward the purpose of being industrious 
(1) by placing him under conditions which make him 
strongly conscious of the desire for promotion; (2) by 
leading him, through the examples of other employees 
and the admonition of his employers, to associate industry 
with his desire as a means of realizing it; and (3) by 
giving him the opportunity to work industriously. If 
distracting temptations were permitted to make con- 
centration upon his work very difficult, the last step 
might not be taken, and the influence of the first two 
would, therefore, be lost. 

Passing from social guidance in the acquiring of new 
purposes to social guidance in the acquiring of new means 



Analysis of the Social Process 165 

of control, we may consider an instance in which an 
individual is led to understand that putting crude oil on 
a pool of stagnant water is a means of avoiding malarial 
fever. (1) If he appreciates the fact that sickness should 
be prevented, his own or his neighbor's sickness due to 
malarial fever, or a newspaper report of the prevalence 
of this disease, may bring with it a desire to prevent such 
trouble in the future. (2) Through printed or spoken 
words the hypothesis that the difficulty is due to the 
presence of mosquitoes is presented to him. He can 
understand this hypothesis, because of its similarity to 
facts which he has acquired regarding the spreading of 
disease germs. The test he accepts as satisfactory in 
this case may be the agreement of medical experts con- 
cerning the truth of the hypothesis. He thus reaches 
the problem of how to get rid of mosquitoes. (3) In a 
similar way, the hypothesis that crude oil on a pool of 
stagnant water prevents it from becoming a breeding 
place for mosquitoes is presented to him as a solution 
of the problem. He understands this through its similar- 
ity to facts he has learned about the nature of insects. 
Here again the test he accepts as satisfactory is the sup- 
port of the hypothesis by scientific experts. (4) He uses 
this means in attaining his purpose of preventing the 
recurrence of malarial fever in his neighborhood. If the 
illustration is modified so that the first step is the purpose 
of merely knowing how to prevent malarial fever, the 
fourth step is an act of will by which the individual 
accepts the solution of the problem as a fact. In either 
case, the need of social guidance is felt especially for the 
second and third steps. With this guidance, he can acquire 
in a very short time a means of control which has been the 
result of years of labor on the part of scientific experts. 



166 The Principles of Education 

All social guidance of the individual must come through 
the medium of material objects, because material objects 
alone are common to the experience of all individuals. 
Since the purposes and means of control of an individual 
are intimately associated with material things, these 
things become the medium for the social control of his 
experience. Other persons may control his meanings and 
feelings of value by manipulating these visible handles, 
as it were, to which these meanings and feelings of value 
are attached. It is by this manipulation that he is guided 
to acquire further purposes and means of control as he 
is made to associate intimately means with ends or to 
define and solve problems. 

Words, which are material things that can be seen and 
heard, are very useful in guiding the individual processes 
through which new purposes and means of control are 
acquired. They are freighted with meanings and feelings 
of values which have been intimately associated with 
them and which it is their special function to bear. The 
close connection of words with the meanings and feelings 
they symbolize is kept alive by daily use. The rich 
burden of experience with which words are connected 
and the ease with which they can be manipulated, make 
them peculiarly suited to guide the process of individual 
development. Like other things words, however, hold 
for the individual only those meanings and values which 
he has already acquired for them through the self-active 
process. They do not convey new purposes and new 
meanings to him directly, but convey these indirectly by 
guiding him through the steps of the processes by which 
purposes and meanings are acquired. 



Analysis of the Social Process 167 

II 

Society leads the individual to appreciate social practices by 
placing its stamp of approval upon them. A natural result of this 
is formalism, which retards social progress. The function of 
history and the fine arts, which are developed under social direc- 
tion, is to free the individual from formalism by leading him to 
appreciate the intrinsic values of things. In doing this, history 
reveals connections between means and ends as they have actually 
appeared in the development of civilization, whereas the fine 
arts are free to present in imagination new connections between 
things and the values they serve. 

The source of all values, as we have learned, is in the 
desires with which individuals are endowed by nature. 1 
All other desires, all other values, are derived from these, 
as feelings of worth are transferred from ends to means, 
in accordance with the process through which new pur- 
poses are made. When the connections between inborn 
desires and the means which the individual uses to realize 
them are so simple and direct as to be clearly evident, 
the means tend to take on independent worth and thus 
to become ends in themselves. This fact appears in the 
simple and direct connection made in primitive times 
between practice in the use of arms and a desire to fight. 
In such cases, society needs to guide the individual merely 
in acquiring means of control ; the eventual change of the 
means into purposes takes care of itself. When with the 
growth of civilization the activities of daily life have 
become very complex, the new means of control invented 
are so far removed from the ultimate ends upon which 
their values depend that their connections with these 
ends are no longer directly evident. Instances of this fact 
may be found in the details of modern governmental 
regulation and in highly specialized work in factories 

1 See p. 79 and pp. 97-98, 



168 The Principles of Education 

under a complex division of labor. This complexity, 
which obscures the connections between means and ulti- 
mate ends, antedates historical times. Even in the case of 
primitive peoples, the simple means of securing food, 
shelter, and protection against enemies, were compli- 
cated, because of the superstitious belief that these means 
must be suited not only to the material world, but also 
to a realm of spirits responsible for changes in the material 
world. 

When the connections of activities with the original 
ends which they served were thus lost sight of, these 
activities were not left without authority. Society ap- 
proved individuals who did them and condemned indi- 
viduals who did not do them. In this way, it made them 
the means of securing social approval and of avoiding 
social disapproval, to both of which the individual is by 
nature sensitive. If this did not lend to the acts sufficient 
authority to command conduct, doing the acts was made 
a means of avoiding physical pain or even death. 

This intimate connection of arbitrary consequences with 
certain acts so as to give these acts purposive values, came 
about naturally. When individuals of the earlier genera- 
tions had come to feel the values of acts as ends in them- 
selves through associating these acts with the original 
purposes they served, these individuals naturally approved 
those of the next generations who did the acts and con- 
demned those who did not do them. The original purpose 
having been lost sight of, the values of things were passed 
on in the same arbitrary manner. When later genera- 
tions met new difficulties in doing these things which they 
had been led to appreciate as means to social approval, 
they invented new means of control to overcome these 
difficulties. In turn, they appreciated the new means as 



Analysis of the Social Process 169 

ends in themselves and passed them on to later genera- 
tions with no guidance as to the values of these things, 
save the social approval they gave to individuals who did 
them. In this way, the stock of things which depended 
for their authority merely upon social approval accumu- 
lated from generation to generation. 

Let us consider briefly an instance of this substitution 
of social approval for the intrinsic values which gave rise 
to various forms of Latin study. In the early part of the 
Italian Renaissance, Latin classics were used as a means 
for guiding people to a fuller realization of human welfare. 
For this reason, the study of these classics received social 
approval sufficient to cause its retention in schools after 
the original purpose had been forgotten. After difficul- 
ties in understanding the Latin classics had been over- 
come by a systematic study of the language itself, this 
study, without reference to other values, as the fact that 
it became purely formal shows, was continued in schools 
because it was socially approved as a thing worth while 
in itself. 

Even down to the present time, society has made much 
use of this way of guiding individuals to feel the values of 
things by connecting these things closely with social 
approval or disapproval. For many of the things that 
we do every day, we have learned no other justification. 
This method of transmitting appreciations of value was 
especially strong in the case of primitive peoples, who did 
not, for the most part, attempt to explain the values 
of things by connecting them with intrinsic ends which 
they served, but rather taught them authoritatively as 
things to be done. In the initiatory rites of savage 
peoples, impressive ceremonies, in many cases preceded 
by fasting and by prolonged silence on the part of the 



170 The Principles of Education 

initiates, made the transmission more authoritative. This 
arbitrary social guidance, in which the true purposes of 
the social practices were lost sight of, led to all the evils 
of formalism, and thus checked the advance of civiliza- 
tion, because practices which had outgrown their true 
usefulness were still continued under social guidance 
merely as means to social approval. Change was put 
under the ban, and people became " tradition bound." 

The development of the subject matter of history served 
to relieve this situation. History shows why things are 
done by revealing the connections of these things as 
means not merely with social approval, but also with the 
remote consequences which alone are responsible for their 
true values. 

In dealing with the various forms of Latin study 
referred to above, history, looking beyond mere social 
approval, would show that the study of the classics had 
been used to serve the purpose of securing human welfare, 
and that, in turn, a systematic study of the Latin language 
had been used to serve the purpose of understanding as 
fully as possible the content of the classics. 

History turns our attention to the past, when social 
life was simpler, and traces from generation to genera- 
tion the new means invented to overcome new difficulties, 
connecting them with the intrinsic purposes which these 
acts served as means, down to the intricate connections 
between means and ends in the present highly complex 
civilization. It reveals in this way why society was led 
to approve various acts. Thus does history give a dis- 
criminating sense of the real worth of practices in our 
present social life, so far as men understood that worth 
when they established the practices. Thus does it free 
social activities from the conservative bonds that tradi- 



Analysis of the Social Process 171 

tion is ever fixing upon them; for many of the things 
which tradition sanctions may be discarded as useless or 
may be improved, when the intrinsic purposes which they 
serve are known. In a word, history helps to save men 
from blind tradition, which approves equally the useful 
and the useless, the good and the bad, if only they once 
become established as social usages. 

But even before the day of history, the development of 
literature and of the other fine arts served to relieve the 
situation in which society arbitrarily guided the individual 
to appreciate things merely as means to social approval. 
The fine arts isolate things from the bewildering complex 
of social action, and, by connecting these things with 
values which the individual strongly feels, lead him to 
appreciate them. The Twenty-Third Psalm, for example, 
isolates the act of following the Lord and connects it with 
various desirable results for the attaining of which this 
act is represented to be the means. In performing their 
function, the fine arts are not limited, as is history, to 
recounting what has actually happened in the develop- 
ment of civilization, but are free to create imaginary situa- 
tions in which means receive value from the ends they 
are represented to serve. In this way, the fine arts 
develop ideals. The details of how this is done will be 
given in the next chapter. It is sufficient here merely 
to state that the fine arts free the individual from the 
formalism of tradition by developing his appreciations of 
worth. 

The making of history and the fine arts is done under 
social guidance. In the case of history, this fact is clearly 
evident, because the historian is dependent upon records 
of the past for the connections he makes between purposes 
and means of control. He traces and records these con- 



172 The Principles of Education 

nections as society experienced them when new means 
were invented from generation to generation in the de- 
velopment of institutional practices. Furthermore, in 
finding and interpreting historical facts, he is guided by 
a technique created through many generations of historical 
investigation and by the conclusions which have been 
reached in previous historical investigations and socially 
transmitted to him by means of books and lectures. That 
the fine arts are made under social guidance is not so 
evident, but, nevertheless, is equally true. Works of 
art, which are patterns for new ideals, are attributed to 
individuals such as Homer, Raphael, Michelangelo, 
Shakespeare, Browning, and Tennyson, who were agents 
through whom social values were expressed; but the 
character of the new ideals to which these works of art 
lead depends upon the artist's place in a developing social 
order. The fact that his poem or picture can guide other 
individuals to the same appreciations that he feels is 
evidence that he must connect means which others already 
understand with ends which they appreciate. He may, 
however, represent these means and values in new com- 
binations, but even here he is under social guidance, 
because these new combinations are based upon the 
thoughts and feelings he has acquired socially. 

Ill 

So long as means of control were developed by a crude trial and 
success method and unsystematically transmitted through imita- 
tion as concrete facts, social progress was seriously limited. The 
function of the sciences, which are developed under social direction, 
is to remove this limitation by organizing means of control, by 
transmitting them in the form of principles rather than as a 
multiplicity of particulars, and by leading to the invention of 
new means of control through a method of procedure devised 
especially for that purpose. 






Analysis of the Social Process 173 

In primitive times, the development of control depended 
entirely upon a crude trial and success method. A new 
means of control was often the result of mere accidental 
variations from the customary ways of doing things. As 
Professor Monroe says with regard to the development of 
the means for making pottery : " Discovering first, 
through the accidental burning of a willow basket from 
around the clay bowl within which liquids were kept, that 
the clay would harden and become liquid proof, the primi- 
tive man for generations continued to make pottery by first 
making the willow basket, plastering it over with clay, 
and then burning out the wooden model. By accident again 
discovering that the clay could be shaped direct, he con- 
tinued for generations to impress the stamp of the unwoven 
willow upon the clay, that it might be burned in, though 
he made no willow model or form." 1 The new variation 
would not, however, be transmitted under social guidance 
were it not understood in the light of previous experience 
to be a means of overcoming a difficulty in attaining some 
purpose. 

A means of control which is developed by the crude 
trial and success method has the disadvantage of being 
closely limited, because it is associated with all the char- 
acteristics of a particular complex thing rather than with 
certain characteristics essential to control. It is trans- 
mitted socially as a concrete fact without reference to 
the causal principle involved. How this limits control 
may be shown by an illustration. When recently a young 
woman's clothing, through an accident with wood alcohol, 
was suddenly enveloped in flames, some one extinguished 
the flames by wrapping her in a rug. An uneducated 
colored woman, who was the first to see the accident and 

1 Monroe, Paul, A Text-Book in the History of Education, p. 11. 



174 The Principles of Education 

who had stood fixed with excitement at the alarming 
situation, found voice to say, " Well ! I done knowed you 
could put out a fire with a blanket, but I never knowed 
you could do it with a rug!" The control which the 
colored woman had acquired under crude social guidance 
was limited thus to a particular means. 

The sciences free man from this limitation. If the 
colored woman had learned that fire is due to the uniting 
of certain gases with the oxygen of the air, and that 
consequently anything which will shut off the air will 
extinguish the fire, she would have had a means of control 
adapted to the essentials of the situation and would not 
have been handicapped by the non-essential character- 
istics of the material used to exclude the air. 

The sciences organize means of control, transmit them 
in the form of principles rather than as many isolated 
particulars, and make advancement more rapid by sub- 
stituting for the hit-and-miss method a definite form of 
procedure in the inventing of new means of control. 
Through the use of this rationally controlled method, 
advancement is made all the more rapidly, because this 
advancement goes from widely controlling principle to 
principle rather than from narrowly controlling particular 
to particular. This fact may be seen within the limits of 
any one field of science, where new principles are developed 
through analogy with those already established ; it may 
be seen also in the relation of one science to another, 
where the principles of one have given, through analogy, 
the hypotheses which were used in making the principles 
of another. In this way, as we have learned, psychology 
is connected with biology, biology with chemistry, and 
chemistry with physics. 1 In a word, science is a means of 

1 See p. 150. 



Analysis of the Social Process 175 

control devised to make more effectual the invention, 
transmission, and use of means of control. 

The making of new patterns for control, whether by 
the hit-and-miss method of primitive man or by the care- 
fully regulated investigations of the modern scientist, is 
done under social guidance. Since the individual is the 
medium through which society works, new patterns for 
control must be made by the individual process. For 
this reason, in cases where records have been made of 
their invention, these new patterns for control are asso- 
ciated with particular individuals in whose experience 
they first appeared. The geometric proposition that the 
square of the hypotenuse of a right triangle is equal to 
the sum of the squares of the other two sides, is attributed 
to Pythagoras; the heliocentric conception of the plan- 
etary system, to Copernicus; the idea of the circulation 
of the blood, to Harvey ; the law of gravitation, to New- 
ton; certain theories of knowledge, to Locke, Leibniz, 
and Kant; certain religious doctrines, to St. Augustine; 
the steamboat, to Fulton; the cotton gin, to Whitney; 
the sewing machine, to Howe; the theory of evolution, 
to Darwin; certain educational methods, to Comenius, 
Herbart, and Froebel; the electric light, to Edison; 
heavier-than-air flying machines, to the Wright brothers ; 
and so on. How society guides the individual process 
in making new inventions such as these may be shown by 
illustration. 

In the first place, society gives to the individual the 
purposes in the pursuit of which his problem arises. The 
primitive man who first found fire to be a means for 
making pottery would have paid no attention to the 
hardening of clay in the fortunate burning of the clay- 
lined willow basket, if he had not lived in a tribe which 



176 The Principles of Education 

had trained him to appreciate the value of containers. 
Whitney would not have thought of the desirability of 
seeding cotton, if he had not lived in a society that, as 
the result of many generations of development, had 
found the value of seeded cotton for textiles and other 
things. If Froebel had not been introduced at Frankfort 
and elsewhere to the school, an institution which is the 
product of centuries of social development, he would not 
have had the purpose of improving educational methods. 
If Darwin had not lived at a time when a social need was 
felt for some widely organizing principle in the field of 
biological science, he would not have had the purpose of 
finding a way to explain the origin of species. 

After the individual has formed his purpose under 
social direction and has experienced a difficulty in realizing 
it, society gives further direction by furnishing the knowl- 
edge upon which he makes, through analogy, the hypoth- 
eses that define and solve the problem. The primitive 
man who first found fire to be a means for making pottery 
recognized difficulties in the use of willow baskets lined 
with unbaked clay and recognized also the effect of fire 
in hardening the clay so as to overcome these difficulties, 
because in his life with others he had come to recognize 
the difficulty and its solution. It was because Whitney, 
under social guidance, had acquired a knowledge of me- 
chanics and other things, that he was able to: construct 
the mechanism for the cotton gin. These scientific ideas 
upon the bases of which he defined and solved his problem 
were the result of many generations of social development. 
Even if the analogy which gives the solution is found 
through the suggestion of some fortunate accident, as is 
said to have been the case in the invention of the cotton 
gin, the suggestion is none the less socially determined; 



Analysis of the Social Process 177 

for it would never have been recognized in its relation to 
the problem, unless the individual had been prepared for 
this through social guidance. If Froebel had not gained, 
under social guidance, ideas of religious mysticism, 
Lamarckian ideas of development through use, and a 
philosophical doctrine of monism which was prominent 
at his time, as well as many other things, he could not 
have defined and solved the problem which resulted in 
his theory of education as the development of the divine 
nature of the child through self -activity. The knowledge 
of the principles of breeding and other things, which 
Darwin had acquired under social guidance, determined 
the nature of the hypotheses that defined his problem and 
led him to the principle of natural selection; for it ap- 
peared that natural selection would do a work similar to 
the selection made by breeders in improving animal stock. 

When the problem has been defined and the solution 
made, society adopts the use of the new means of control 
and thereby adds it to the stock of patterns to be handed 
down from generation to generation. This is due to the 
fact that individuals who have been guided through the 
previous steps naturally pass on to the realization of the 
purpose which started the process. 

Because of the difficulty of making the analogy which 
leads to the new means of control, new social patterns 
which mark important steps in advance usually appear 
first in the experience of only exceptional individuals, 
the names of some of whom have been given. After a 
new means of control has once been made, the common 
man, as has been said, can see the analogy which it bears 
to the truth he has already received under social guidance, 
and can thus take the steps necessary to acquire the new 
meaning. 



178 The Principles of Education 

Sometimes social conditions guide several individuals to 
invent a new means of control at practically the same 
time. Striking instances of this appear both in contests 
for patent rights and in cases where the courts are not 
called upon to settle the questions of priority. Bell and 
Gray both claimed credit for the invention of the tele- 
phone. James and Lange share credit for a certain theory 
of the emotions; Darwin and Wallace, for a certain 
theory of evolution ; Dewey, James, and Schiller, for the 
philosophic doctrine of pragmatism. 

In a large degree, social patterns are made coopera- 
tively. Thousands are working under social guidance in 
particular lines of specialization in religious, industrial, 
commercial, scientific, political, or other social activities. 
As soon as one person has denned a new problem, formed 
a new hypothesis for its solution, or put any hypothesis 
to the test, whatever actual advance he has made may be 
transmitted to other persons, so that they may center 
their energies upon making still further advance. Scien- 
tific and other journals devoted to particular kinds of 
work give good opportunity for such free exchange of ex- 
perience. 

As a new means of control is copied by individual after 
individual, it is simplified. This is conspicuous in the 
case of machinery. The first locomotives, threshing ma- 
chines, automobiles, and typewriters were clumsy com- 
pared with those of later times. The clumsy parts are 
simplified usually through the small inventions of many 
individuals. The same is true in the case of means of 
control in sciences, education, politics, and every other 
field of activity. Sometimes the individual who puts 
the new idea in a simple and clear verbal form so that 
others can acquire it easily, is the one who gets credit for 






Analysis of the Social Process 179 

inventing it, because it is socially transmitted in the form 
he gives to it. 

IV 

Through history and the fine arts the individual may acquire 
new means of control, and through the sciences he may acquire 
new ideals ; but, in either case, these results are only incidental 
and not attained so economically and effectively as under the 
guidance of subject matter especially designed to give them. 

The distinction we have made between the function of 
history and the fine arts on the one hand and that of the 
sciences on the other, is relative rather than absolute. 
Contrary to this distinction, it is true that through history 
and the fine arts an individual may acquire new means of 
control, and through the sciences he may acquire new 
purposes. But these results, in either case, are only 
incidental ; they are by-products, secondary results, 
which can be attained more economically and effec- 
tively under the guidance of other subject matter spe- 
cially designed for that purpose. 1 

So far as purpose-giving subject matter is concerned, 
an individual who has learned through history how things 
were done in the past may find some of these means of 
control useful in overcoming difficulties in the present; 
but various sciences, such as political science, economics, 
sociology, and military science, are more effective and 
reliable guides for overcoming present difficulties. These 
sciences are the accumulated product of generations .of 
thought in the service of this very purpose. It is not 
uncommon, indeed, for these sciences to reveal that 
means of control used in the past were not the best in 
the situations in which they were used. It is true that 

1 See pp. 112-113. 



180 The Principles of Education 

the social sciences use some of the material used by 
history; but they select from the records of the past 
only certain kinds of facts and work them over according 
to the method of the science concerned, not according to 
the method of history. The comparison of a textbook 
in economics with a textbook in history will make this 
fact clear. The social sciences undertake to discover the 
relations of cause and effect among social facts in order 
to provide scientific knowledge that may be used to solve 
our social difficulties and thereby to improve our social 
practices; history, on the other hand, undertakes to 
discover the purposes responsible for our social practices, 
whether these practices are useful or not. 

That the fine arts are less effective and reliable than 
sciences in giving control is so patent as not to require 
discussion. Improvement in control depends upon a 
thoughtful solution of problems, which is characteristic 
of the sciences. The fine arts, however, in order to create 
new appreciations of worth, must emphasize feeling rather 
than thought ; they must call forth strong appreciations 
of value with which means of control are associated rather 
than devise with cool deliberation these means of control 
themselves. 

The various sciences are made for the individual who 
has already acquired through other social influences the 
desire to use them, and are not fashioned, therefore, to 
develop such desire. They center attention so exclusively 
upon control that the appreciations of value aroused by 
them are too weak to exert much influence in transforming 
means into ideals. A person does not study the science of 
medicine in order to make himself desire to become a 
physician, but, on the contrary, his desire to become a 
physician leads him to study medicine. The scientific 



Analysis of the Social Process 181 

textbooks he uses are not concerned with putting a halo 
of value about the medical profession, but with the solu- 
tions of detailed problems in bacteriology, physiology, 
anatomy, pharmacology, etc. 

The sciences may develop purposes to some degree, 
but they are not so effective in doing this as are social 
approval and purpose-giving subject matter. It is gen- 
erally recognized that, for instance, grammar, logic, and 
ethics are comparatively weak in developing desires for 
correctness in speech, cogency in argument, and goodness 
in conduct. Each of these sciences is fashioned to give 
control to individuals who already have the purpose 
which it serves. But are not sciences such as physics, 
chemistry, and mathematics excellent guides to such 
general virtues as industry, accuracy, neatness, impar- 
tiality, and truthfulness? In answer, it may be asked 
whether these sciences ever refer directly or indirectly 
in any way whatsoever to the virtues mentioned. The 
individual may learn outside the limits of the content of 
these sciences the truth that he can secure the desired 
results in scientific study only by having these virtues, 
and thus may carry over to these virtues the values of 
the ends desired ; but the sciences themselves do not tell 
him this. They provide merely one of the many classes 
of activities in which such ideals may be useful. 



A short-sighted view of the functions of history, the fine arts, 
and the sciences discloses only the immediate pleasure which they 
give, and makes it appear that their most important use is to 
afford refined pleasure to the individual during his leisure hours. 
Their essential function is no more to give pleasure, however refined 
and valuable it may be, than the essential function of eating and 
drinking is to tickle the palate and refresh the throat, rather than 



182 The Principles of Education 

to nourish the body for action. By developing and organizing his 
purposes and means of control, these classes of subject matter 
capitalize the individual's hours of leisure against the day of 
action. 

History, the fine arts, and the sciences, under normal 
conditions, give pleasure to the individual. There is 
pleasure in dwelling upon the interesting life of ancient 
Athens and Rome, seeing the creations of Michelangelo 
and Raphael, witnessing the plays of Shakespeare, read- 
ing the poems of Browning and Tennyson, admiring the 
wonders revealed by Euclid and Copernicus. Some 
thinkers have been so short-sighted as not to see beyond 
this immediate feeling and have assumed that the chief 
use of history, the fine arts, and the sciences is to give 
refined pleasure to the individual during his leisure hours. 
If any result more permanent than this pleasure is recog- 
nized by such thinkers, it is vaguely called culture, defined 
only in terms of feeling, and classed with silk hats and 
kid gloves, which give an appearance of worth to the man 
whose head and hands they adorn. This belief is most 
prevalent with regard to the fine arts. Some practical 
value is generally admitted for history and still more for 
the sciences. A wider view reveals the fact that all of 
these classes of subject matter are primarily guides to 
results so important as to overshadow completely what- 
ever immediate pleasure or whatever more permanent 
but equally impractical adornment they may give to the 
individual. Just as eating and drinking are not merely 
for tickling the palate and refreshing the throat or even 
for making the body more beautiful, but serve the far 
greater purpose of sustaining and developing the body 
for action, so history, the fine arts, and the sciences serve 
the purpose of sustaining and developing the character 



Analysis of the Social Process 183 

of the individual. The individual who profits normally 
by the guidance of these subjects acquires more than 
mere adornment; he capitalizes his hours of leisure 
against the day of action. If he has been led to acquire 
ideals that are worthy and strong, and control that is 
organized and efficient, he will stand in the hour of trial 
when others go down before temptation and difficulty. 
Instead of giving only temporary pleasure in the time of 
leisure and personal adornment afterwards, these sub- 
jects, under normal conditions, make leisure of practical 
value by turning it into the service of action. At no time 
can man escape his destiny, which is practical. 

The short-sighted view of the value of history is given 
by Herbert Spencer, who says with regard to the contents 
of books on this subject : 

They are facts from which no conclusions can be drawn — 
unorganizable facts; and therefore facts which can be of no service 
in establishing principles of conduct, which is the chief use of facts. 
Read them, if you like, for amusement; but do not flatter yourself 
they are instructive. . . . The only history that is of practical value, 
is what may be called Descriptive Sociology. And the highest office 
which the historian can discharge, is that of so narrating the lives of 
nations, as to. furnish materials for a Comparative Sociology; and for 
the subsequent determination of the ultimate laws to which social 
phenomena conform. 1 

It is true that many writers of books labeled history have 
not understood clearly the function of this subject and 
have presented, therefore, so much useless material that 
the true function of the subject matter is obscured. 
Spencer's condemnation of many books of his time that 
purported to be histories, is, in a large measure, justifiable. 

1 Spencer, Herbert, Education, 1890, pp. 52, 55. 



184 The Principles of Education 

But he is short-sighted in failing to see, amid the mass of 
irrelevant matter given in these books, connections of 
social practice and social purpose which give to the 
reader a more appreciative insight into the present com- 
plex social situation, not by leading him to the best ways 
of meeting social difficulties, as the sciences would do, but 
by lifting the curtain of formalism which conceals the 
purposes of present social activities, irrespective of 
whether these activities are effectual or not. The history 
of education, for example, does not reveal what subject 
matter should be in the curriculum; that is a question 
for science to answer. It does reveal, however, the pur- 
poses which led men to select the subject matter now in 
the curriculum. With reference to these purposes edu- 
cators may eliminate that part of the curriculum which 
has been selected in the interest of purposes no longer 
valuable, may modify other parts so as to attain more 
effectively the purposes they serve, and may supply new 
subject matter for realizing purposes not provided for 
in the old curriculum. 

When Spencer says, " The only history that is of prac- 
tical value, is what may be called Descriptive Sociology/' 
he does not recognize the practical value of history, but 
that of something else essentially different from history 
in both purpose and method, and which cannot be made 
history by changing its name. Far from being a mere 
servant, a mere hewer of wood and drawer of water for 
the sociologist, the historian has an independent mission 
of his own and aids human development in a practical 
way that is just as necessary, useful, and honorable as 
the work of the sociologist. 

The short-sighted view of the value of the fine arts 
also may be stated in the words of Spencer : 



Analysis of the Social Process 185 

And now we come to that remaining division of human life which 
includes the relaxations, pleasures, and amusements filling leisure 
hours. After considering what training best fits for self-preserva- 
tion, for the obtainment of sustenance, for the discharge of parental 
duties, and for the regulation of social and political conduct ; we have 
now to consider what training best fits for the miscellaneous ends 
not included in these — for the enjoyments of Nature, of Literature, 
and of the Fine Arts, in all their forms. Postponing them as we do 
to things that bear more vitally upon human welfare ; and bringing 
everything,- as we have, to the test of actual value; it will perhaps 
be inferred that we are inclined to slight these less essential things. 
No greater mistake could be made, however. We yield to none in the 
value we attach to aesthetic culture and its pleasures. Without 
painting, sculpture, music, poetry, and the emotions produced by 
natural beauty of every kind, life would lose half its charm. So far 
from thinking that the training and gratification of the tastes are 
unimportant, we believe the time will come when they will occupy 
a much larger share of human life than now. When the forces of 
Nature have been fully conquered to man's use — when the means 
of production have been brought to perfection — when labor has 
been economized to the highest degree — when education has been 
so systematized that a preparation for the more essential activities 
may be made with comparative rapidity — and when, consequently, 
there is a great increase of spare time ; then will the poetry, both of Art 
and Nature, rightly fill a large space in the minds of all. . . . Archi- 
tecture, sculpture, painting, music, poetry, etc., may be truly called 
the efflorescence of civilized life. 1 

It is true that the fine arts do belong, in a large measure, 
to the leisure time of life. When the individual is per- 
mitted to escape the wearisome demands of practical life 
with its serious responsibilities, they offer to him easy 
pathways to a delightful land of make-believe, where his 
imagination can play unrestrained and his spirit can be 
refreshed. But although he may not be conscious of the 
fact, play is conducive here, as elsewhere, to the serious 
business of life ; it is not for itself alone. The kitten that 
1 Spencer, Herbert, Education, 1890, pp. 57-59. 



186 The Principles of Education 

scampers after a leaf fluttering in the wind, is preparing 
for the necessity later of capturing its prey ; children in 
their many forms of play gain better control of their 
bodies, and acquire other abilities useful in the practical 
life. Likewise, while the individual is enjoying good 
poetry, sculpture, painting, or music, he is developing 
and organizing, with no conscious effort on his part, 
feelings of value, which as purposes take the leadership 
of his conduct in the world of practical activity and 
thereby make his life more worthful. While enjoying 
the play Hamlet, he acquires an appreciation of the value 
of action to realize his ideals when " the time is out of 
joint ; " while enjoying the singing of the national 
anthem, he enriches his appreciation of national ideals. 

When Spencer says that he yields to none in the value 
he attaches to aesthetic culture and its pleasures, and 
that without painting, sculpture, music, poetry, and the 
emotions produced by natural beauty of every kind, life 
would lose half its charm, he looks no further than the 
immediate enjoyable feelings that come with them, not 
to their value as definite guides to more worthful action 
beyond the library, art gallery, music room, or scene of 
natural beauty. When he calls the. fine arts the efflores- 
cence of civilized life, the champion of the sciences is not 
mindful that flowers have important functions in the 
economy of plant life, but intends to convey the impres- 
sion that they are produced only to be looked at and 
smelled ! This short-sighted view makes it appear that 
the fine arts will come to their own after all social diffi- 
culties have been vanquished. If, however, the influence of 
the fine arts in giving ideals and thereby in preparing men 
to work for the advancement of civilization is recognized, 
Spencer's conclusion here is as illogical as to hold that a 



Analysis of the Social Process 187 

worker should postpone preparing for the duties of his 
calling until he has the leisure that goes with a retiring 
allowance. 

When the fine arts arouse feeling, they must, according 
to the laws of. human development, nourish the ideal 
nature of acts associated with these feelings. This fact 
has been explained in the discussion of how new purposes 
are made. 1 This transfer of value is inevitable, for every 
thrill of appreciation is an incipient purpose which com- 
mands activity for the realization of the value revealed 
by it ; and though acts but touch the hem of the garment 
of this feeling, virtue gets into them and makes them 
appear worthful in themselves. There must always be 
two kinds of values derived normally from the fine arts ; 
the immediate pleasure which comes with appreciation, 
and the enrichment of ideals through the transfer of feel- 
ing. One is a fleeting thrill; the other is a permanent 
acquisition in the building of character. There can be 
no question as to which marks the essential function of 
the fine arts. 

Only when the ideal-giving subject matter is connected 
with the hours of work as well as with the hours of leisure, 
can it give even the refined enjoyment which has loomed 
so large before the short-sighted. Because men have 
hungered and loved and fought and lost and triumphed 
and worshiped, they can appreciate the best in poetry, 
painting, and music. Symbolic reference to these things 
by the fine arts arouses strong emotion just because they 
do point to practical realities which men feel in the pulsa- 
tions of their own blood. And not only must apprecia- 
tion be fed constantly in this way by values which orig- 
inate in the practical life, but, if the individual does not 
1 See pp. 72-74. 



188 The Principles of Education 

act to realize the purposes to which the fine arts direct 
his attention, his capacity for getting pleasure from the 
fine arts is decreased. The first stage of this is 
marked by vapid sentimentality and the next by the 
unresponsiveness of the blase. In a word, the thrills 
which are aroused by the fine arts have inherited their 
worth from the practical life out of which they have been 
born, and it is their duty to pass on this inheritance to a 
progeny of new and better leaders for life's struggle. If 
they fail to do this, their birthright has been sold for a 
mess of pottage. 

That the practical value of the fine arts overshadows 
the value of the momentary pleasure which they give, 
is evident when the two come into conflict. In the case 
of food, the sense of taste gives pleasure and at the same 
time guidance as to what should be eaten. But no matter 
how much enjoyment the eating of anything gives, if 
we find that the result is injurious to the body, there is 
no question as to whether temporary pleasure or per- 
manent welfare of the body should be preferred. So in 
the case of the fine arts, no amount of temporary pleasure 
can ever be justified when it is known to result in a lower- 
ing of ideals and consequent perverted conduct. The 
pleasurable excitement given by the fine arts is only 
incidental ; the main result is their effect upon action. 

The truth that the fine arts have important practical 
effects beyond the mere giving of pleasure does not mean 
that either the artist or the individual enjoying the art 
creation must be conscious of these effects, any more than 
that, in the enjoyment of a meal, one must be conscious 
of the process of nutrition and the effect of the food upon 
the body ; or that in play the child must be conscious of 
the preparation which he is receiving for the serious busi- 



Analysis of the Social Process 189 

ness of later life. In the fine arts, attention should be 
centered upon those things which give thrills of apprecia- 
tion and those things which through connection with 
these thrills of appreciation receive new values. The 
consequences take care of themselves, and any analysis of 
consequences would cool the feeling, bring in other asso- 
ciated ideas than those to be given value, and thus distract 
from the purpose-making process. In fact, it would 
center attention upon the solving of problems and thereby 
substitute the control-making process for the purpose- 
making process. So far as the individual is concerned 
at the time, the intelligent appreciation of fine arts is an 
end in itself, but, nevertheless, he receives the benefit 
for practical life. The essential value of his experience 
in studying the fine arts depends upon this benefit. 

The short-sighted view which, in seeking the function 
of sciences, looks no farther than the immediate pleasure 
in contemplating scientific truth, dates back to the time 
of Plato and other classical philosophers. Some of the 
leaders of thought then reached the conclusion that the 
highest ideal towards which man can struggle on earth 
and which in heaven is the supreme attribute of the 
Divine Being is knowledge, — not knowledge for the sake 
of control, but knowledge for its own sake. Sciences, 
according to this view, are their own justification. Simply 
to know them repays fully the student for burning the 
midnight oil; the noble pleasure which the contempla- 
tion of truth inspires in him is the greatest reward for 
his long and arduous task. 

This belief has a strong foundation in human nature. 
Individuals have an inborn desire to know, which is 
manifested throughout life, from childish curiosity to 
philosophic wonder. Copernicus, when a child fingering 



190 The Principles of Education 

unfamiliar objects, asked what they were and found 
pleasurable satisfaction when his nurse classified them 
with reference to the meanings he had already acquired. 
Copernicus, when he had become a man and had put 
away childish things, still retained his desire to know and 
became dissatisfied when some celestial phenomena were 
found to be strangers to the meanings which older 
astronomers had taught him. Since there was no repre- 
sentative of society to make the needed explanation, he 
worked patiently until he found a classification of phenom- 
ena which gave these strangers their places. Since the 
desire to acquire knowledge is so prominent in the scientist 
and philosopher, who give their lives to such work, their 
judgment with regard to the function of the sciences is 
liable to be prejudiced by this desire. 

Does the pleasurable feeling in contemplating truth, 
however noble this feeling may be, mark the essential 
function of the sciences? Has nature given us hunger, 
love, and zest in the battle of life only that Satan may 
have a means by which to tempt us from the holy ex- 
perience in our laboratories and libraries? Or do we go 
into our laboratories and libraries not only to contemplate 
the truth that may be found there ; but also, — which 
is far more important, — to acquire means to satisfy our 
hunger, to consecrate our love, and to win in the battle 
of life our spiritual freedom? 

The nature of knowledge itself gives the answer. Just 
as truly as the fine arts begin and end in practical life, 
and depend upon it for sustenance, so do the sciences. 
Ideas which are embodied in means of control, whether 
they are the data with which the sciences begin or the 
principles with which they end, are, as we have learned, 
plans of action that have been developed in overcoming 



Analysis of the Social Process 191 

practical difficulties. Their meanings are just these uses. 
To be captured by some investigator and cooped in the 
pigeonholes of a scientific treatise for the mere purpose 
of being looked at, is indeed a sad fate for them. Shut 
off from their useful connections with practical action, 
they would become dead forms from which the life of 
meaning has departed. And then even the contempla- 
tion of them would lose its pleasurable satisfaction. 

The " pure " scientist, who seeks truth for its own sake, 
represents only one phase of scientific activity specialized 
in the division of labor. He is justified in not looking 
beyond his immediate purpose of seeking the truth, 
because others, by applying his conclusions to the prac- 
tical affairs of life, supplement his work and thereby give 
to it significance and value. 1 

History, the fine arts, and the sciences organize the 
individual's appreciations and means of control so as to 
make them the pathways through which life is guided to 
its fullest and best realization. The worth of these 
classes of subject matter in this service determines the 
value of the immediate pleasure and cultural influence 
which they give. Whoever does not see beyond this 
immediate pleasure reaches a short-sighted conclusion 
that would separate appreciation and theory on the one 
hand from practice on the other, and would eventually 
preclude the attainment of the highest values of either. 
Just as the parts of the human body get their full signifi- 
cance and value from their functional relations to the other 
parts of the body, so do the various forms of experience 
get their significance and value from their functional 
relations to the other forms of experience. Just as the 
parts of the body are members one of another, so these 
1 See pp. 262-264. 



192 The Principles of Education 

forms of experience are members one of another. Iso- 
lated they dwindle and die, but working together in the 
service of the whole, both they and the whole of which 
they are parts attain the highest welfare. 

VI 

The materialistic account of the factors in the development of 
adjustment to environment through the connecting of acquired 
reactions with systems of habits and through the forming of new 
reactions, supports our conclusions with regard to the two kinds 
of social patterns and with regard to the functions of history, the 
fine arts, and the sciences. 

Natural science, to which we shall now look for addi- 
tional evidence, supports the conclusion that, in determin- 
ing what purposes and what means of control may be 
acquired by the individual, society furnishes, through the 
medium of matter, two kinds of patterns. The human 
organism is born with an incomplete nervous system, 
which is developed through interaction with the environ- 
ment. 1 Stimuli from the environment and reactions 
thereto control the exercise of the nervous system, which 
" grows to the ways in which it has been exercised." 
The development of the reactions of the immature organ- 
ism depends primarily upon the causal influence of actions 
of other organisms in the environment and changes which 
they have made in material things. For this reason the 
reactions developed after birth may truly be called a 
social inheritance. The environmental influence cannot, 
however, change directly the connections between stimuli 
and responses in the immature organism, but must exert 
its causal influence by affecting the processes through 
which the nervous system acquires new reactions. There 

1 See pp. 42-43. 



Analysis of the Social Process 193 

are two kinds of such processes, — one, through which a 
new reaction that has been acquired is brought into 
intimate connection with a system of habits, and the 
other, through which the nervous system is modified so 
as to produce a new reaction. These, we have found, 1 
are the material counterparts of the teleological processes 
through which new purposes and new means of control 
are made. Since changes in the nervous system depend 
thus upon the influence of the material environment, 
matter only is the medium through which one organism 
can affect another. Material forms which regulate the 
development of nervous connections in the organism may 
properly be called patterns. 

Natural science explains, from its point of view, that 
the primary function of history and the fine arts is to 
develop purposes. When the same forms of reaction 
have been acquired in common by mature organisms, as 
in the case of the activities of the home, the state, and the 
church, these forms of reaction are fixed as social habits. 
Succeeding generations may acquire them not through 
interaction with the environmental conditions which 
caused them in the first place, but through interaction 
with these other organisms. If the immature organism 
does not imitate these forms of reaction, other organisms 
may even affect it adversely, making these forms of re- 
action necessary for adjustment to the other organisms. 
It may be possible that the situations to which these 
reactions originally made adjustment no longer exist. 
Habits that have become intrinsically useless may thus 
be perpetuated comparatively in isolation merely because 
they are necessary for adjustment to organisms which 
possess them. This handicap to the development of 
1 See pp. 92-96 and 122-126. 



194 The Principles of Education 

efficient adjustment is overcome only when these reac- 
tions are connected with the fundamental systems of 
habits which turn them to their true uses with relation 
to the environment. This is what history and the fine 
arts do. History causes the organism to make connec- 
tions between acquired reactions and fundamental habits 
as they have occurred in the development of the race. 
The fine arts make similar connections which are useful 
in adjustment, but which may not have occurred pre- 
viously. These forms of subject matter, which through 
material word symbols affect the immature organism, 
are created by group interaction. The particular line of 
least resistance along which nervous energy first makes 
the new connection is formed in some individual organism 
as the result of the interaction of this organism with 
others. This organism may then through words make 
a similar connection in other organisms. 

The function of the sciences, according to the material- 
istic view, is to make adjustment more efficient in a way 
which corresponds to making means of control. When 
the form of adjustment to a concrete situation is modified 
through the influence of only this particular situation, 
this form of adjustment is connected with the total 
stimuli of the situation. To make the reaction function 
again, stimuli representing non-essentials as well as those 
representing essentials of the situation must recur to- 
gether. This limits the effectiveness of the response as 
in the case of the colored woman who did not react in 
the situation dress-on-fire-and-rug-on-floor, although she 
had acquired the reaction to the situation dress-on-fire- 
and-blanket-on-bed, which was essentially the same. The 
reaction would function only when the non-essential 
stimuli peculiar to the blanket were present. A great 



Analysis of the Social Process 195 

advance is made in adjustment when connections are 
made between the essentials of situations and the essen- 
tials of reactions that adjust the organism to them. In 
the case just cited, one step in that direction would be 
the connecting of the reaction shutting-off-the-supply-of- 
oxygen with the essential stimuli belonging to both 
blanket and rug in the situation something-ori-fire-and 
rug-or-blanket-near-by. The further this is carried, — 
that is, the more situations are simplified so that one form 
of reaction will be connected with a larger number of 
situations, — the more effective does adjustment become. 
Reactions also may be simplified by eliminating non- 
essential movements. For instance, the woman might 
have attempted to wrap the blanket about a victim of 
fire in some special way that had been used under similar 
circumstances, when some other way would have fitted 
the situation better. The case cited above in which 
primitive man unnecessarily impressed the stamp of 
unwoven willow on pottery, is another instance of this. 
Organizing the essentials of reactions is just what the 
sciences do. The sciences, which appear largely in the 
form of word symbols that affect the immature organism, 
are created by group influence, since, although each ad- 
vance is made through some particular organism, it is 
causally dependent upon other reactions which have been 
acquired under group influence. 

The materialistic view supports the facts that means 
of control acquired under the guidance of history and the 
fine arts, and purposes acquired under the guidance of 
the sciences are developed only incidentally and not in 
the most economical ways. The efficiency of new re- 
actions developed by history and the fine arts is not 
tested systematically as the sciences would test it, and 



196 The Principles of Education 

indeed, these reactions may not give the best adjustment 
to the environment. On the other hand, connections 
made by sciences between new reactions and larger sys- 
tems of habits are not so intimate and thorough as those 
made by history and the fine arts. 

Natural science reveals very definitely the short-sight- 
edness of the belief that the essential function of history, 
the fine arts, and the sciences is to give pleasure. The 
organism is made for active adjustment to environment. 
In this adjustment process, the brain is the medium be- 
tween the incoming nerves, which bring stimuli from the 
environment, and the outgoing nerves, which cause re- 
actions to this environment. Brain changes are thus 
in the service of action. Since thoughts and feelings 
are the counterparts of brain changes, their fundamental 
significance, too, is practical. Indeed, history, the fine 
arts, and the sciences are biological necessities in the 
development of adjustment to environment ; they mark 
a new chapter in this development. 



REFERENCES 

Charters, W. W., Methods of Teaching, 1912, pp. 26-40. (Discusses 
the nature of subject matter from the functional point of view.) 

Bagley, W. C, Educational Values, 1911, pp. 164-179. (Points to 
history, biography, literature, art in any of its forms, and reli- 
gion as the chief sources of materials for the direct development 
of ideals.) 

Baldwin, J. M., Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental Develop- 
ment, 1906, pp. 465-484. (Shows the social influence in the 
development of subject matter.) 

Robinson, J. H., The New History, 1912, pp. 1-25. (Discusses the 
function of history.) 

Parker, DeW. H., The Principles of ^Esthetics, 1920. (Gives an 
analysis of the nature and meaning of art.) 



Analysis of the Social Process 197 

Gordon, K., Esthetics, 1909, pp. 46-67. (Explains the origins and 
functions of art.) 

Fairchild, A. H. R., The Making of Poetry, 1912, pp. 187-209. 
(Discusses the need and value of poetry.) 

Thorndike, E. L., Principles of Teaching, 1906, pp. 198-202. (Holds 
that the emotions have a practical value.) 

Thomson, J. A., Introduction to Science, 1911, pp. 224-248. (Ex- 
plains in a simple manner the utility of science.) 

PROBLEMS 

1. Why should teachers have definite ideas of the functions of the 
various kinds of subject matter they teach? 

2. Name five ideals you have acquired as a result of your home 
influence and explain how you acquired them. 

3. Name five means of control you have acquired in the home 
and explain how you acquired them. 

4. Name five ideals you have acquired that were created or 
strengthened by the study of history or literature. 

5. Name five valuable means of control you have learned from 
the study of science. 

6. a. Can you trace any ideal you have formed to the study of 
Latin, mathematics, English grammar, or physical science? 6. If 
so, explain how the ideal was derived from this study. 

7. If a teacher believes that knowledge is an end in itself and not 
for the sake of action, what is the most serious error he is liable to 
make in teaching geography or grammar? 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE NATURE OF PATTERNS FOR PURPOSES — 
HISTORY AND THE FINE ARTS 

The particular natures of history and the several fine arts are 
determined by various limitations under which they guide in form- 
ing new purposes. In giving an appreciative understanding of 
present social practices, history is limited to connecting them 
intimately with purposes in the service of which they were estab- 
lished. Literature, sculpture, painting, architecture, and music 
are free to represent necessary or probable connections between 
means and ends, irrespective of whether these have been experi- 
enced before, but are limited in various ways by different media 
of expression. A new and widely influential medium of artistic 
expression is the moving picture. The freedom of the fine arts in 
transferring values makes it easily possible for them to be perverted 
so as to give false appreciations of worth. . 

I 

The problem of this chapter is to find in detail how history 
and each of the more important fine arts guide in forming new 
purposes. History is limited to past experiences ; the fine arts 
are free to create probable situations that may not have actually 
existed. The fine arts differ one from another because they use 
different media of expression. 

History and the fine arts, as we have learned, are the 
truest guides in forming new purposes. Sciences may 
develop purposes incidentally, but sciences are concerned 
essentially with making means of control, not with the 
far-reaching values which these means of control may 
serve. Social authority is widely influential and very 

198 



History and the Fine Arts 199 

effective in developing purposes, but its guidance is 
unreliable and arbitrary. Social authority, it is true, 
puts a stamp of approval upon acts because they have 
been found worthful, just as governmental authority 
puts a coinage stamp upon gold because the gold is 
valuable in itself. But acts are less stable in value than 
gold ; they may depreciate greatly when better standards 
are found ; they may become even worthless when social 
conditions change ; and yet those which have lost much 
or all of their value may still retain the social stamp. 
History and the fine arts, however, reveal the intrinsic 
values of acts as truly as the methods of the assayer test 
gold. Not only are they truer guides than social authority 
because they are more reliable, but they are truer to the 
nature of the individual, for they free him from arbitrary 
social authority. They lead him to accept purposes, 
not through external compulsion, but because his inner 
nature demands them, because he feels them necessary 
for personal development, through which he may realize 
his highest possibilities and become in the fullest sense 
himself. 

Our problem now is to examine history and each of 
the more important fine arts separately, so that we may 
learn in greater detail how they function as purpose- 
giving subject matter. Each of them conforms to the 
law which controls the making of new purposes ; each 
brings to consciousness valuable ends, associates inti- 
mately with these ends means of control, and under 
normal conditions, leads to action; but they do this in 
various ways, because of differences in scope and dif- 
ferences in media of expression used. 

The wider distinction is between history and the fine 
arts. History gives accurately the essentials of past 



200 The Principles of Education 

experience, and is limited, therefore, to purposes that 
people have actually had and to the means they have used 
for realizing these purposes ; the fine arts are free to create 
situations that are probable, but may never have existed 
in real life. A truly historical account of Julius Caesar can 
ascribe to the conqueror only that which he actually said 
and did, but Shakespeare's Julius Cxsar, a work of literary 
art, may ascribe to him purely imaginary words and acts. 

Because the fine arts may present purely imaginary 
situations, they can reveal between means and ends 
intimate connections that appear universally applicable, 
— true yesterday, to-day, and forever. Not limited to 
particular dates and localities, these experiences may be 
felt applicable to all men. When David says " The 
Lord is my shepherd," we may feel that through countless 
generations the Lord is the shepherd of all who love and 
follow Him. Turner's The Slave Ship makes us feel a 
horror for slavery, no matter when or where slavery exists. 
The fine arts, it is true, may represent historical situa- 
tions ; but, when this is done, the situation is taken out 
of its particular setting and universalized, so that its ap- 
plication belongs to no particular time and space. As 
Aristotle says, " There is no reason why some real events 
would not have that internal probability or possibility 
which entitles the author to the name of poet." * 

The essential distinction between history and the fine 
arts may be summarized in the words of Aristotle: 
" It is, furthermore, evident . . . that it is not the function 
of the poet to relate what has happened, but what may 
happen, giving what is possible according to the law of 
probability or necessity. The poet and the historian 
differ not by writing in verse or in prose. The work of 
1 Aristotle, Poetics, IX. 



History and the Fine Arts 201 

Herodotus might be put into verse and it would still 
be a species of history, with meter no less than without it. 
The true difference is that one is related to what has 
happened, the other to what may happen." 1 This 
distinction will become clearer in the separate discussions 
of history and the several fine arts. 

The fine arts differ one from another, because they are 
limited in various ways by different media of expression. 
Sculpture and painting are limited by marble and canvas 
to the presentation of a single situation, and must, there- 
fore, bring to mind by implication whatever else is needed 
to create the new appreciation of value ; poetry and music 
can present sequence of situations. This is why Aristotle 
calls sculpture and painting arts of rest as distinguished 
from poetry and music, which he calls rhythmic arts. 
Sculpture, which uses media of three dimensions without 
significant variation in color, excels in expression of form, 
but is greatly limited in expression of spiritual character- 
istics; painting, which uses as media colors on a plane 
surface, excels in the expression of spiritual characteristics, 
but is greatly limited in the expression of form. When 
early Greek artists represented perfections of the human 
body, they made statues, which could be viewed from 
all sides ; when Christianity turned the attention of later 
artists to perfections of spirit, they painted pictures in 
which spiritual manifestations, appearing best from one 
point of view, which usually includes facial expression, 
are of prime importance. Again, sculpture is not suited 
as is painting to representing woodland and lake, moun- 
tain and valley. Architecture may be classed with sculp- 
ture and painting as an art of rest, with obvious limita- 
tions due to the special media used. Poetry, with its 
1 Aristotle, Poetics, IX. 



202 The Principles of Education 

symbolic words, differs from music, which makes a direct 
appeal to the feeling through combinations of tones. How 
the differences in media used for expression make dif- 
ferences in ways in which the several kinds of fine arts 
give ideals, will appear more definitely in separate dis- 
cussions of the fine arts. 

Sometimes fine arts are used in combination, as when 
poetry is set to music. Such combinations do not need 
separate discussions; an understanding of the natures 
of the separate arts reveals how they work together 
effectively in combination. They may work together 
easily, because all conform to the same general law in 
guiding to new ideals. 

II 

History gives an appreciative understanding of social practices 
by connecting them intimately with purposes in the service of which 
they were established. It thus prevents formalism, strengthens the 
desire to participate in valuable social practices, and makes social 
practices in all institutions plastic for improvement. Failure to 
understand the function of history has led to (1) factualism, 
(2) fiction, (3) sensationalism, and (4) the confusion of history with 
the social sciences. 

A person who has entered a theater when the later 
scenes of an unfamiliar drama are being enacted, fails 
to appreciate the full significance of the present action, 
unless he learns what has taken place in the earlier scenes. 
We have entered the world after centuries of action have 
passed in the drama of the school, of the government, and 
of other institutions. In order to appreciate the full 
significance of what is being done, we, too, must learn 
what has taken place before; in other words, we must 
learn the history of these institutions. 

The essential function of history is to give an apprecia- 



History and the Fine Arts 203 

tive understanding of present social practices by connect- 
ing them intimately with the purposes in the service of 
which they were established. Social practices, as we have 
learned, were originally means of control devised to over- 
come difficulties in the way of attaining things people 
considered worth while. 1 They were solutions of problems 
to which these difficulties gave rise. Trial by a jury of 
peers was a solution of the problem how to preclude 
prejudice which stood in the way of justice; the Chinese 
examination system was a solution of the problem how 
to select for office men most thoroughly versed in the 
Chinese Classics, and the use of special examination cells 
was the solution of the problem how to prevent candidates 
from getting assistance; a congress composed of senate 
and house of representatives was a part of the answer 
to the problem how to secure wise legislation, which would 
represent the will of the people and yet be saved from 
sudden fluctuations in popular opinion. After a social 
practice has been long established, the specific purpose 
for which it was created is gradually forgotten, unless 
there is something to keep men mindful of this purpose. 
As a result, the practice tends to become formal; it is 
continued merely because it is a custom indorsed by 
social approval, not because people have a discriminating 
sense of its value. It may be used, therefore, when the 
advance of science has revealed better practices which 
might be substituted for it ; because, when men are not 
conscious of the purpose of a practice, they have no way 
to judge its effectiveness, since its effectiveness is its 
usefulness in attaining this purpose. Furthermore, it 
may be continued after the purpose which it originally 
served is no longer of value and its usefulness has thus 
1 See pp. 167-168. 



204 The . Principles of Education 

been entirely outgrown. Examples of the one or the other 
of these conditions may be found whenever unreasoned 
conservatism stands in the way of beneficial reform. 
Men who justify their opposition to change in social 
practice merely on the ground that what was good enough 
for their forefathers is good enough for them, are under 
the bondage of formalism. To prevent formalism by 
increasing the true appreciation of those social practices 
which are good, so that men feel a new desire to perform 
them, and by making inferior social practices plastic 
for improvement, is an important service in the develop- 
ment of civilization. History performs this service by 
associating intimately social practices with the intrinsic 
purposes they serve. 

History has been defined as " past politics." This 
is due to the fact that much attention has been given to 
the political aspect of social life, because the values of 
justice and freedom are so fundamental, and because the 
making of political institutions that do not yield to private 
advantage has been so difficult. But all social practices 
should have their histories, — industrial, educational, 
literary, scientific, philosophical, musical, religious, and 
all other kinds. Every practice, in whatever field it 
may be, needs to be saved from the deadening effect of 
formalism. 

Because our present social practices are bewildering 
in complexity and because the purposes they serve are 
usually not directly evident, it is necessary to study the 
past in order to get an appreciative understanding of the 
present. Through tracing step by step their growth from 
simpler forms, we can more easily understand and appre- 
ciate the complex social practices of the present, as in the 
case of our getting an appreciative insight into the modern 



History and the Fine Arts 205 

textile industry by tracing the development of this in- 
dustry from the days of the hand loom. 1 Furthermore, 
through a study of the past, we can find the purposes 
responsible for the origin, modification, and change in 
value of our various social practices. Men who were 
directly concerned with making new practices or changes 
in old ones were obviously of all men most clearly aware 
of the purposes which led them to do these things. 

Brief illustrations taken from politics and education 
will show concretely that an appreciative insight into 
present social practices can be had only in the light of the 
past. The democratic government of the United States 
is an organized accumulation of ways of doing things 
political, which has been the outgrowth of many genera- 
tions of struggle for human rights. It includes practices 
which were devised long before Magna Charta, the Bill 
of Rights, and freedom from England. Every change, 
however simple, in the development of the government, 
was made to overcome some difficulty in realizing a 
purpose, which, at the time, was keenly appreciated and 
consciously sought by those responsible for the change. 
The constitutional amendment requiring election of 
United States senators by popular vote is a recent example 
cf this fact. This change in the practice of electing the 
United States senators was made mainly for the purpose 
of overcoming difficulties which the election of the senators 
by state legislatures put in the way of the expression of the 
people's will and for the purpose of precluding the evils 
which resulted from the election of state legislators with 
reference to their preferences for senatorial candidates 
rather than with reference to their fitness for enacting 
wise legislation. We must seek the motives for such 
1 For a detailed example, see pp. 286-289. 



206 The Principles of Education 

changes in the records of the times when the changes 
were made. A change made in one generation may, 
indeed, be modified many times in later generations, and 
both the original purpose and the ones in the interest of 
which modifications were made must, therefore, be 
understood in order to evaluate properly the practice 
in its resulting form. How could one get an appreciative 
understanding of the method by which the president of the 
United States is now chosen> except through a knowledge 
of the purposes and consequent modifications of practice 
that have come with the growth of the machinery of 
political parties? Again, a discriminating sense of the 
educational situation at the present time can be had 
only in the light of the past, where the practices are found 
consciously connected with the purposes which they were 
made to serve. The Hebrew ideal of national worship of 
Jehovah; the emphasis of Athenian philosophers upon 
contemplation as the highest good; the Roman love of 
power in the practical world ; the other-worldly spirit of 
monasteries; the gallant dreams of chivalry; worths 
sought in the Italian Renaissance, Protestant Reformation, 
and French Revolution; ideals of statesmen, scientists, 
and industrial leaders, have all given the authority of 
their values in a greater or less degree to phases of present 
educational practice. The historical method is the only 
method whereby this intricate network of means and 
ideals can be unraveled. 

While historians are studying the records of the past, 
they must not forget, however, that the ultimate guide to 
the relative importance of what they find is the appre- 
ciative insight it gives into the social life of the present. 
The value of history, as of all subject matter, depends 
upon its use in guiding action in the present; both the 



History and the Fine Arts 207 

teleological and materialistic views of human development 
have taught us this fact. 1 Whatever subject matter is 
not thus valuable is a mere incumbrance, worse than 
useless, because it consumes time and energy which might 
otherwise be given to that which is worth while. 

If an historian should ignore the present social situa- 
tion, he would have no guide for his investigations, and 
would, consequently, become lost in the maze of centuries 
of human activities. In order to make definite progress, 
he must be able to distinguish between important and 
unimportant matters. Just as one must look to the oak 
in order to understand the importance of the acorn; 
just as one must look to the socially developed man in 
order to understand the importance of the various tend- 
encies to activity in the child; so one must look ulti- 
mately to the outcome of past events in our present social 
life in order to determine the relative importance of these 
events. As Davidson points out : 

When Columbus set sail across the untraversed western sea his 
purpose was to reach by a new path a portion of the old, known 
world, and he lived and died in the belief that he had done so. He 
never knew that he had discovered a new world. So it was with 
Socrates. When he launched his spiritual bark upon the pathless 
ocean of reflective thought his object was to discover a new way to 
the old world of little commonwealths and narrow interests, and he 
probably died thinking that he had succeeded. He did not dream 
that he had discovered a new world — the world of humanity and 
universal interests. But so it was; and though mankind are still 
very far from having made themselves at home in that world, and 
from having availed themselves of its boundless spiritual treasures, 
it can never again be withdrawn from their sight, nor the conquest 
of it cease to be the object of their highest aspirations. 2 

1 See pp. 182-184 and p. 196. 

2 Davidson, Thomas, The Education of the Greek People, p. 118. 



208 The Principles of Education 

Again, the magnificent Roman court was the center of 
interest nineteen centuries ago. It seemed completely 
to overshadow the cross upon which, in an obscure part 
of the world, a man of lowly family, in a despised nation, 
was crucified between two thieves. The crucifixion 
seemed to affect only a few men in humble walks of life ; 
even these went away discouraged. But the place of 
Christianity in our civilization to-day shows that . the 
cross overshadowed in importance the palace of Caesar. 
Browning suggests the dramatic reversal of contem- 
poraneous judgment, which could not, of course, see the 
future, when he makes Cleon write to Protus, with 
reference to St. Paul : 

Thou canst not think a mere barbarian Jew 

As Paulus proves to be, one circumcised, 

Hath access to a secret shut from us ? 

Thou wrongest our philosophy, O king, 

In stooping to inquire of such an one, 

As if his answer could impose at all ! 

He writeth, doth he? well, and he may write. 

Oh, the Jew findeth scholars ! certain slaves 

Who touched on this same isle, preached him and Christ ; 

And (as I gathered from a bystander) 

Their doctrine could be held by no sane man. 

It is true that the immediate purpose of an historical 
investigator may not go beyond the past event which 
he is studying. The making of history is too big a task 
for one man. There must be a division of labor in which 
investigators must delve in the records of remote events 
in order to determine, with the greatest possible accuracy, 
the facts with regard to these events. But the essential 
significance of the work of every special historical in- 
vestigator depends entirely upon the value of the con- 
tribution he makes to history as a completed instrument 



History and the Fine Arts 209 

for social guidance. The man who, in a large factory, 
selects hickory for the spokes of automobile wheels 
must be intent upon selecting with the greatest accuracy 
the pieces of hickory to be used; but he might as well 
spend his time selecting pebbles, if it were not for the 
usefulness of the machine to which he makes a contribu- 
tion. The significance and value of what he does depends 
upon that of the completed product to the making of 
which he contributes. This is as true in the making 
of history as in the making of automobiles. 

Failure to recognize the essential function of history 
has led, among other things, to (1) factualism, (2) fiction, 
(3) sensationalism, and (4) the confusion of history with 
the social sciences, the function of which is to give control 
rather than appreciative insight. These things have 
interfered with the most effective making and use of 
history. 

(1) It is of primary importance that history present 
as accurately as possible the facts with regard to past 
events ; but this should not be permitted to obscure the 
importance of interpreting these facts, so that, in the 
completed history, they are connected with one another 
up to the present time. As in the case of the individual, 
society no sooner establishes a new practice for over- 
coming some difficulty in the way of what is felt to be 
worth while than it projects out of this situation other 
purposes and establishes other practices for attaining 
them. Through the centuries, the connection of social 
purposes is unbroken even to the present time. Facts 
not held together by this chain of purposes are discon- 
nected, isolated, useless; they have no significant place 
in social development, and do not give a better apprecia- 
tive insight into it. We cannot understand and appre- 



210 The Principles of Education 

ciate the various acts done by an individual unless we 
know his purpose, what he is trying to accomplish. Our 
first question is, What is he trying to do? Likewise, we 
cannot understand and appreciate social activities unless 
we know the purposes they serve. The mere fact that 
our national Congress meets as two houses gains its true 
significance only when we know the purpose for this divi- 
sion of the legislative branch of the government. Pur- 
poses are final causes, the only causes that history can 
recognize. They are as essential to history as efficient 
causes are essential to natural sciences; interpreting 
facts by connecting them with purposes is as much a sine 
qua non of history as explaining efficient causal relations 
of phenomena is a sine qua non of natural sciences. 

Especially in the condensation of historical statement 
is there grave danger of interpretation being squeezed 
out, so that mere facts are left. This is an example : 

Robert the Wise (of Anjou) (1309-1343), the successor of Charles II 
of Naples, and the champion of the Guelphs, could not extend his 
power over Sicily where Frederick II (1296-1337), the son of Peter 
of Aragon, reigned. Robert's granddaughter, Joan I, after a career 
of crime and misfortune, was strangled in prison by Charles Durazzo, 
the last male descendant of the house of Anjou in Lower Italy (1382), 
who seized on the government. Joan II, the last heir of Durazzo 
(1414-1435), first adopted Alfonso V, of Aragon, and then Louis III, of 
Anjou, and his brother, Reno. Alfonso, who inherited the crown of 
Sicily, united both kingdoms (1435), after a war with Rene and the 
Visconti of Milan. 1 

Condensation of statement should be secured not by the 
omission of all interpretation, but by the omission of the 
less important facts and their interpretation, while the 
more important facts with their interpretation are 
retained. 

1 Quoted by J. H. Robinson in The New History, p. 3. 



History and the Fine Arts 211 

Commenting upon the factual quotation given, Professor 
Robinson says that " in treating the Italian Renaissance, 
this writer has chosen barely to mention the name of 
Francesco Petrarca, but devotes a twelfth of the available 
space to the interminable dynastic squabbles of southern 
Italy." Such lack of perspective is inevitable in the 
absence of interpretation, because the facts themselves, 
as we have learned, do not reveal their own importance. 
Their relative importance depends upon the parts they 
play in social development, and these parts are revealed 
only through interpretation, which places them in a 
connected purposive development. 

When the relative importance of facts is lost sight of, 
undue emphasis is likely to be given to biographical details 
and to individual matters of little social consequence, 
because these are definite, simple, and often easy to find. 
They are valuable historically, however, only in the degree 
that they throw light upon social practice. Individuals 
such as Petrarch, Luther, and Rousseau, who figured 
prominently in social changes, acquired under social 
direction, as we have learned, their purposes, problems, 
and the bases for the solutions of these problems. In 
each case, the individual's solution was limited to the 
social problem as he understood it and to the use of 
social ideas he had acquired. In so far as his conclusions 
were adopted by society, biographical details which give 
a clearer understanding of these matters are truly sig- 
nificant, for they throw light upon a social movement. 
Biographical details which have no wide social signifi- 
cance are mere encumbrances to history. 

(2) Contrasted with factualism is the tendency on the 
part of some writers to let fiction usurp the place of care- 
fully verified and accurately stated facts in what purports 



212 The Principles of Education 

to be history. Extreme cases of this can be found in the 
writings of monks of the Middle Ages, where mere hear- 
say and uninvestigated statements of marvelous happen- 
ings were accepted as facts, if only they were in harmony 
with the preconceived interpretations which the writers 
wished to place upon them. Even in modern times, 
especially when the writer is strongly partisan, as in the 
case of Macaulay, a tendency to warp facts to fit preju- 
diced interpretations may be found. The evil of this 
is apparent. 

(3) Another fault due to a failure to understand the 
true function of history is sensationalism. Detailed 
accounts of battle scenes and stories of non-essential 
dramatic episodes are instances of this. The latter 
need no comment. Warfare is a means through which 
men have settled conflicts of religious, political, economic, 
and other purposes. The desires that led men to battle 
may be of far-reaching historical significance, but the 
details of battles and of military campaigns do not give an 
insight into these conflicting values, the fate of which 
hangs in the balance. Military students, who wish to 
get an appreciative understanding of the practices of 
warfare, would find such accounts useful; but men in 
general, who have no need to become expert in managing 
military campaigns, would profit more by historical 
accounts that give an appreciative insight into institu- 
tional activities in which they are daily engaged. 

Surely the sensationalism of war is not needed to arouse 
interest in the past, when the historian has before him 
the whole realm of values which, generation after genera- 
tion, engrossed the attention of the people of the time 
and gave zest to their lives, values which have often been 
consecrated by great sacrifice made in their service. 



History and the Fine Arts 213 

We are of the same human nature as our forefathers, 
and able, therefore, to sympathize with them in their 
desires and difficulties. The situations of the past which 
were intensely interesting to them will produce no small 
degree of interest in us, if the essentials of these situations 
are presented with accuracy and vividness. 

To reveal accurately and vividly the essentials of social 
situations in the past so as to make readers appreciate 
the values sought by the men of the time, imposes upon 
the historical writer a difficult task, for which the " yellow 
journalistic " appeal to primitive interests is an easy 
substitute. Just as cheap literature gets its interest 
from " blood and thunder/ ' so does cheap history. In 
neither case does that which is given come close home to 
the daily lives of men and give significance and value 
to what they do. 

(4) A failure to understand the essential function of 
history has led to confusing it with the social sciences, 
the function of which is to give control. History is 
concerned with what people actually did and why they 
did it; science is concerned with finding the causal 
relations of things so that the most effective means may 
be available, whether any one ever used them or not. It 
is not uncommon, indeed, as has been said in a previous 
chapter, 1 for sciences to show that practices established 
in the past are not the most effective for realizing the 
purposes in the service of which they were devised, as 
in the case of recent scientific conclusions as to the effec- 
tiveness of formal discipline in education. 

As patterns for control, social practices of the past 
are no more adequate than the machinery of the past. 
Growth of civilization means the improvement of methods 
1 See pp. 179-180. 



214 The Principles of Education 

for attaining ideals as well as the development of new 
purposes. Older methods are cast off as inadequate when 
better ones have been devised to take their places. Polit- 
ical constitutions, religious creeds, methods of manu- 
facturing, educational practices, are no sooner made than 
they are found in need of improvement, antiquated. 
Not many years ago, women supposed to be witches were 
burned to rid the world of untoward influences, slavery 
was justified by Biblical interpretation, guilt was tested 
by finding whether the accused man, when put into water, 
would sink with the weight of iniquity. As Professor 
Robinson says, " It is true that it has long been held that 
certain lessons could be derived from the past, — precedents 
for the statesman and the warrior, moral guidance and 
consoling instances of providential interference for the 
commonalty. But there is a growing suspicion, which 
has reached conviction in the minds of most modern 
historians, that this type of usefulness is purely illusory." 1 

The historian who confuses history with social sciences 
is liable to criticize the effectiveness of past social practices 
in the light of modern sciences, when such criticism serves 
only to confuse the real issue. As historian he is not 
concerned with the faults which modern sciences reveal 
in past practices, but with the faults that were recognized 
by the people of the time and that thus led to new pur- 
poses, new problems, and the changes in practices which 
the solutions of these problems brought about. In going 
beyond this, he brings foreign considerations into the 
discussion of an historical situation which is complicated 
enough as it is. 

Emphasis upon control in historical writing has tended 
to bring history itself into disrepute. Men are led to 
1 Robinson, J. H., The New History, p. 17. 



History and the Fine Arts 215 

compare its effectiveness in giving control with that of 
social sciences, which are especially designed for control. 
In such comparison, history must always appear at a 
disadvantage. Much of the dissatisfaction with the 
history of education as a subject for the professional 
training of teachers is due to an attempt to use it to 
secure results in control, for which the history of educa- 
tion was never rightly intended. Methods of teaching, 
to cite one form of control, are not to be learned econom- 
ically and effectually from the study of the writings of 
Plato, Quintilian, Rousseau, Pestalozzi, Herbart, and 
Froebel, but from the study of the most recent books 
giving a scientific treatment of this subject. The works 
of these reformers throw light upon certain stages in the 
history of education and thereby help us, so far as methods 
of teaching are concerned, to appreciate the ideals which 
the present practices serve and to understand the problems 
these practices are intended to solve ; but the determina- 
tion of the best solutions of these problems . belongs to 
the field of science. From Plato's doctrine of formal 
discipline to Froebel's belief in a mysterious symbolism, 
many of the teachings of these reformers are not supported 
by the scientific conclusions of to-day. 

History must always be a complement of the sciences, 
not a rival of them. History reveals the purposes under- 
lying our institutional practices, it shows the ends for 
which they were intended, and thereby keeps alive social 
problems; but when the effectiveness of these practices 
is to be determined, when we wish to find whether the 
practices can be improved, we must close our histories 
and open our books in the social sciences, which organize 
activities according to their causal values for the sake 
of control. History saves us from the deadening influence 



216 The Principles of Education 

of formalism, — that is, of acting without appreciating 
the true purposes of our acts; the sciences show us 
how to improve our practices when we appreciate the 
ends these practices serve. Both are necessary to the 
best human development. 

Ill 

Literature incites feelings of worth mainly through words which 
symbolize strongly appreciated ideals and through the more direct 
appeal of rhythm. It then presents, either by direct statement 
or suggestion, a means of control which receives a crown of value 
through intimate association with this worth. Nature poetry 
keeps us mindful of fundamental values by making common things 
symbolic of these values. 

A work of literary art in furnishing a pattern for a new 
purpose must incite feelings of worth. This step is the 
first in the process through which a new purpose is made. 1 
Literature incites feelings of worth for the most part by 
means of words, which are material things connected in 
previous experience with feelings of worth possessed by 
the individual. Just as a painter who sees in imagina- 
tion the glory of a sunset, presents what he sees to others 
by combining on the canvas various colors, so a literary 
artist who feels some worth which crowns an ideal, presents 
it to others by combining in their consciousnesses various 
feelings of value which natural endowment and past 
experience have already provided for them. These 
original and acquired feelings of worth are the stuff with 
which he must work. They appear as halos of ideals 
possessed by the individual, and may be called to con- 
sciousness by words which symbolize them. Prominent 
in literature, therefore, are words which symbolize strong 
feelings of worth, such as those of love in its various forms, 

1 See p. 72. 



History and the Fine Arts 217 

physical and moral valor, joyful satisfactions of nature, 
aversion to suffering, mystery of life, horror of death, hope 
of immortality, dependence upon and reverence for a 
Supreme Being. These were old when the world was 
young; they pulsate strongly in human experience. 
Guided by intuition, through which feelings are known 
and appreciated by being felt, not by objective mechanical 
construction, the literary artist combines them so as to 
make the feeling of worth which he wishes to express. 

The music of the words can be used in literature to 
arouse feeling in addition to that which comes to mind 
with the ideals symbolized. Stately serious spondees, 
joyfully bounding anapaests, and all other musical forms 
to which spoken language is subject, make a direct appeal 
to feeling. In Poe's The Bells, this music is very promi- 
nent. Listen : 

Hear the sledges with the bells — 
Silver bells ! 
What a world of merriment their melody foretells ! 
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, 

In the icy air of night ! 
While the stars that oversprinkle 
All the heavens, seem to twinkle 
With a crystalline delight ; 
Keeping time, time, time, 
In a sort of Runic rhyme, 
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells 
From the bells, bells, bells, bells, 
Bells, bells, bells — 
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells. 

Again, in Annabel Lee, the musical element is prominent. 

And neither the angels in heaven above, 
Nor the demons down under the sea, 

Can ever dissever my soul from the soul 
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee : 



218 The Principles of Education 

For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams 

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; 
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes 

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; 
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side 
Of my darling — my darling — my life and my bride, 

In the sepulchre there by the sea, 

In her tomb by the sounding sea. 

The form of poetry demands musical quality. The form 
of literary prose does not demand it, but prose, as well as 
poetry, may incite feeling by its music. Dickens's story 
of the death of Little Nell in The Old Curiosity Shop has an 
effective musical quality. 

She was dead. No sleep so beautiful and calm, so free from trace 
of pain, so fair to look upon. She seemed a creature fresh from the 
hand of God, and waiting for the breath of life; not one who had 
lived and suffered death. 

I lor couch was dressed with here and there some winter berries 
and green leaves, gathered in a spot she had been used to favor. 
"When I die, put near me something that has loved the light, and 
had the sky above it always." Those were her words. 

She was dead. Dear, gentle, patient, noble Nell, was dead. 
Her little bird — a poor, Blight tiling the pressure of a ringer would 
have crushed — was stirring nimbly in its cage ; and the strong 
heart, of its child-mistress was mute and motionless for ever. 

Where were the traces of her early cares, her sufferings, and 
fatigues? All gone. Sorrow was dead indeed in her, but peace 
and perfect happiness were born; imaged in her tranquil beauty and 
profound repose. 

And still her former self lay there, unaltered in this change. Yes. 
The old fireside had smiled upon that same sweet face; it had passed, 
Like a dream, through haunts of misery and care; at the door of 
the poor schoolmaster on the summer evening, before the furnace 
fire upon the cold wet. flight, at the still bedside of the dying boy, 
there had been that same mild, lovely look. So shall we know the 
angels in their majesty, after death. 



History and the Fine Arts 219 

But literature must do more than merely stir up feeling. 
If it did no more than this, it would not guide the individ- 
ual to new ideals, but would only recall in various com- 
binations appreciations he had already acquired. If a 
new ideal is to be developed under the guidance of a 
literary pattern, the halo of feeling which the literary 
work has brought to mind must be transferred to some 
means of control intimately associated with the appre- 
ciated worth. This means of control is, indeed, necessary 
to give unity to a literary work, for all the appreciations 
of value called forth are called forth to give this means of 
control a new halo of worth ; they unite in it. Then the 
individual must act in realizing the appreciated value 
through the means of control associated with this value, 
but this last step is not provided by the literary pattern. 
It is left to follow as a result of the other two steps. 

Let us now find these steps in several typical works 
of literary art. Owing to its brevity, simplicity, and 
directness, the Twenty-Third Psalm reveals the steps 
clearly. The function of this psalm is to give a new 
worth to the idea of the Lord as a Being to be worshiped 
and obeyed. The Hebrews had, at one time, been led to 
appreciate the Lord as a man made large, who walked in 
the Garden of Eden and talked with Adam and Eve. 
Later they regarded Him as a mighty warrior, irresistibly 
leading His chosen people. Still later they felt towards 
Him as towards a just judge, who would punish iniquity 
and reward righteousness. But in the mind of David 
there had developed a new ideal of Jehovah, a new value 
in worship and obedience. In the expression of this 
value, he gave to those of his own and later generations 
a work of literary art which would guide them to this new 
ideal of the Lord. 



220 The Principles of Education 

It is not necessary to suppose that the psalmist wrote 
his poem with the deliberate purpose of guiding others to 
the new ideal he appreciated. He may have sung out 
of the fullness of his heart, giving expression to the feelings 
that welled up within him. Intuition guided him, how- 
ever, to call to mind ideals with strong halos of apprecia- 
tion, to stir up feeling through the music of his words, 
and to associate intimately with the resulting feeling the 
idea of following the Lord as a means for realizing the 
values appreciated. 

Pastoral life had developed in men of his nation a 
feeling of value associated with the good shepherd, who 
loved his sheep, protected them from danger, and kept 
them from want. When the psalmist says " The Lord 
is my shepherd; I shall not want," the feeling towards 
the shepherd becomes associated with the idea of following 
the Lord, in accordance with the law controlling the 
making of new purposes ; for following the Lord appears 
to be the means through which this value may be realized 
in the lives of men. The poem then leads to the enrich- 
ment of appreciation by dwelling upon more specific 
values. Green pastures and deep wells of cool water 
would naturally call forth a glow of feeling in the minds 
of men accustomed to t the vicissitudes of pastoral life. 
With this added feeling is the statement that the Lord 
is the means to the realization of the value it crowns. 
One by one, different appreciations, including those 
created by the music of the verse, are thus carried over 
to the idea of the Lord as the poet continues : 

He restoreth my soul : he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness 
for his name's sake. 

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, 
I will fear no evil : for thou art with me ; thy rod and thy staff they 
comfort me. 



History and the Fine Arts 221 

Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies : 
thou anointest my head with oil ; my cup runneth over. 

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow .me all the days of my 
life ; and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever. 

As all of these feelings of value fuse, they make a new crown 
of appreciation for the idea of following the Lord, and 
thereby give men a new purpose in obedience and worship. 
Thus is the psalm a pattern for guiding experience in 
making a new ideal. 

In Browning's Cleon, which has been quoted in part 
in the discussion of history, the reader feels Cleon's 
despair in the attempt to satisfy the deepest longings of 
his soul through philosophy, art, and pagan religion; 
while heightened in effect through contrast with these 
appear the values for which Cleon yearns. He says : 

"But," sayest thou — (and I marvel, I repeat, 
To find thee tripping on a mere word) "what 
Thou writest, paintest, stays ; that does not die ! 
Sappho survives, because we sing her songs, 
And iEschylus, because we read his plays ! " 
Why, if they live still, let them come and take 
Thy slave in my despite, drink from thy cup, 
Speak in my place. Thou diest while I survive? 
Say rather that my fate is deadlier still, 
In this, that every day my sense of joy 
Grows more acute, my soul (intensified 
By power and insight) more enlarged, more keen ; 
While every day my hair falls more and more, 
My hand shakes, and the heavy years increase — 
The horror quickening still from year to year, 
The consummation coming past escape, 
When I shall know most, and yet least enjoy — 
When all my works wherein I prove my worth, 
Being present still to mock me in men's mouths, 
Alive still, in the phrase of such as thou, 
I, I the feeling, thinking, acting man, 



222 The Principles of Education 

The man who loved his life so over-much, 

Shall sleep in my urn. It is so horrible, 

I dare at times imagine to my need 

Some future state revealed to us by Zeus, 

Unlimited in capability 

For joy, as this is in desire for joy, 

— To seek which, the joy-hunger forces us : 

That, stung by straitness of our life, made strait 

On purpose to make prized the life at large — 

Freed by the throbbing impulse we call death, 

We burst there as the worm into the fly, 

Who, while a worm still, wants his wings. But no ! 

Zeus has not yet revealed it ; and alas, 

He must have done so, were it possible ! 

Live long and happy, and in that thought die, 
Glad for what was ! Farewell. And for the rest, 
I cannot tell thy messenger aright 
Where to deliver what he bears of thine 
To one called Paulus ; we have heard his fame 
Indeed, if Christus be not one with him — 
I know not, nor am troubled much to know. 
Thou canst not think a mere barbarian Jew 
As Paulus proves to be, one circumcised, 
Hath access to a secret shut from us? 
Thou wrongest our philosophy, O king, 
In stooping to inquire of such an one, 
As if his answer could impose at all ! 
He writeth, doth he? well, and he may write. 
Oh, the Jew findeth scholars ! certain slaves 
Who touched on this same isle, preached him and Christ ; 
And (as I gathered from a bystander) 
Their doctrine could be held by no sane man. 

Thus through delicate suggestion, which is stronger than 
bold affirmation because the reader himself leaps to the 
discovery, Christianity is recognized to be the means of 
satisfying the deepest yearnings of the human soul. In 
this flash of intimate association, the thrill of appreciation 



History and the Fine Arts 223 

is carried over to Christianity, which receives a brighter 
crown and is, therefore, more strongly cherished. 

The play Hamlet is a guide for developing the purpose 
of prompt action in doing one's duty. Hamlet, a young 
man of splendid idealism, returns from university life to 
find a shocking situation in his home. His father, who 
was king, has been murdered, and his mother is living in 
unholy union with the murderer, her former husband's 
brother. The demands of moral law written deep in 
human nature through centuries of experience could not 
have been expressed more clearly than in Hamlet's words, 

The time is out of joint ; — O cursed spite, 
That ever I was born to set it right ! 

This is the key to the whole situation. The ideals created 
in his earlier experience cry out for realization. He is 
clearly conscious of the fact. But what does he do? 
Opportunity after opportunity is given him to strike for 
their realization, but each time he hesitates, trifles with 
opportunity, procrastinates action. With each failure 
to act, he is caught more tightly in the web of fate, from 
which obedience to the moral law would have delivered 
him, until the consequences are appalling. Most pathetic 
of all, Ophelia, Laertes, and Hamlet himself, are unneces- 
sarily sacrificed on the altar of procrastination, because 
Hamlet has neglected opportunities to realize an ideal 
the authority of which he felt from the first. Each 
calamity is pictured through description and suggestion 
in such manner as to intensify feeling, and each in turn 
is discovered to be the consequence of Hamlet's pro- 
crastination. " Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall 
he also reap ; " the value of the sowing is the value of 
the harvest. Not through mere intellectual symbolism, 



224 The Principles of Education 

but in the pulsations of his own heart does the reader 
find a new ideal value in immediate action to realize his 
ideals, a value which tends to make his practical life more 
effective. The essential function of tragedy is indicated 
by the last words of that master of tragedy, Euripides: 
" gods of mortals, give humanity light, that it may 
learn the source of its griefs and learn to avoid them ! " 

Nature poetry not only creates new purposes, but also 
keeps us mindful of them by associating them with 
common things about us. Quotations from the Bible 
are sometimes hung in homes with a view to keeping the 
occupants mindful of religious ideals which should guide 
their daily lives. In an analogous way, nature poetry 
makes objects that we meet everywhere remind us in an 
effective way of the purposes which are important in 
human life. 

The little flower is given a new crown of value as the 
means of revealing what God and man are, when Tennyson 
says: 

Flower in the crannied wall, 

I pluck you out of the crannies, 

I hold you here, root and all, in my hand, 

Little flower — but if I could understand 

What you are, root and all, and all in all, 

I should know what God and man is. 

One who has acquired this appreciation sees in the flower 
the mystery of human life and is carried over the petty 
purposes of the moment to comprehensive ideals. These 
ideals tend to annul the momentary desires which conflict 
with them and to intensify those which are in harmony 
with them. They bring the individual into the presence 
of the more fundamental values of life, which as purposes 
take leadership in guiding his conduct. 



History and the Fine Arts 225 

The individual who has fully appreciated Bryant's 
To a Waterfowl, is reminded of God's care, when he sees 
the bird soaring above him. Two stanzas are quoted : 

There is a Power whose care 

Teaches thy way along that pathless coast, — 

The desert and illimitable air, — 

Lone wandering, but not lost. 



He who, from zone to zone, 

Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, 

In the long way that I must tread alone, 

Will lead my steps aright. 

To repeat Mrs. Browning's verses which allude to 
Moses and the burning bush, 

Earth's crammed with heaven, 

And every common bush afire with God ; 

But only he who sees takes off his shoes. 

Nature poems make us see. They make us live in the 
presence of fundamental values. 

In dealing with nature, the poet is often led to make 
things appear to participate in human experience; or, 
in other words, to personalize them. A new world of 
values is thus opened for common things, so that these 
things appear not only as means to the realizing of human 
ideals, but also as consciously sharing with man the 
process of realization. Longfellow's Autumn, which is 
here quoted in part, exemplifies this personalizing. 

There is a beautiful spirit breathing now 
Its mellow richness on the clustered trees, 
And, from a beaker full of richest dyes, 
Pouring new glory on the autumn woods, 
And dipping in warm light the pillared clouds. 
Morn on the mountain, like a summer bird, 



226 The Principles of Education 

Lifts up her purple wing, and in the vales 
The gentle wind, a sweet and passionate wooer, 
Kisses the blushing leaf, and stirs up life 
Within the solemn woods of ash deep-crimsoned, 
And silver beech, and maple yellow-leaved, 
Where Autumn, like a faint old man, sits down 
By the wayside a-weary. . . . 

Burns reads human experience into the mouse when he 
says: 

Thou saw the fields laid bare and waste, 
An' weary winter comin' fast, 
An' cozie here, beneath the blast, 

Thou thought to dwell, 
Till, crash ! the cruel coulter past, 

Out thro' thy cell. 

" Ambitious ocean," " scolding winds," " threatening 
clouds," " joyful sea," — such examples are innumerable. 

It is unnecessary to give any extended illustrations of 
prose literature, because prose literature is like poetry, 
except that its form only permits rather than demands 
a musical quality. Lincoln's speech at the dedication of 
the cemetery at Gettysburg creates a strong appreciation 
by calling to mind the consecration of the soldiers who 
gave their lives for their country, and by adding to this 
appreciation the effect of rhythmic language. In turn, 
this appreciation is carried over to the cemetery which 
symbolizes it and which holds this value in a permanent, 
objective way for all men who have been led to appreciate 
it. 

Prose fiction, whether it associates human acts with 
their consequences or whether it gives deeper apprecia- 
tions of nature, conforms as does poetry to the law con- 
trolling the making of new purposes. Through imaginary 



History and the Fine Arts 227 

situations artistically presented, feelings of value are 
incited and carried over to ideas intimately associated 
with them as means to end. If this leads to action, the 
reader acquires new purposes. 

IV 

Sculpture calls forth feelings of worth mainly by symbolizing a 
strongly appreciated climax of action and by the more direct appeal 
of beauty of form. It also suggests the means which is to receive 
value through intimate association with these feelings of worth. 

Sculpture must make the best of the one unchanging 
presentation to which it is limited. What poetry would 
tell in successive verses, sculpture must present all at once. 
The kind of appeal that poetry makes through rhythm 
and harmony of sounds, sculpture makes through beauty of 
physical form. A statue, in so far as it is symbolic, must 
represent the climax of events, the part richest in feeling. 
In the best sculpture, as in the case of the Laocoon Group, 
the sculptor, instead of representing the climax directly, 
represents a situation near it, so that the excited imagina- 
tion of the observer may be free to create its own image 
of the climax. The climax represented only in the imagi- 
nation of the observer arouses stronger feeling than the 
climax directly represented by the statue would arouse. 
The statue must associate intimately with the strong 
feeling of value excited some means for realizing this 
value. 

The statue of Olympic Zeus leads to an appreciation 
of a supernatural personality just as truly as the Twenty- 
Third Psalm leads to an appreciation of the Lord. Colos- 
sal size, perfect physical development, and bodily control 
that makes it appear easy for Zeus to rise and hurl a 
thunderbolt, incite an appreciation of power. Every 



228 The Principles of Education 

feature impresses the observer with the dignity and 
nobility of the god. Feelings of value are called to con- 
sciousness by beauty of form. As all these appreciations 
fuse, they are carried over to the supernatural personality 
represented, just as various appreciations called forth by 
the Twenty-Third Psalm are carried over to the Lord. 
When universalized, the statue gives an appreciation of 
divinity, although the observer may not believe that the 
pagan god truly represents this divinity. 

The Laocoon Group illustrates an instance in which 
sculpture symbolizes a story that must be understood, 
if the new ideal is developed. One could appreciate 
this work of art without understanding the meaning sym- 
bolized, just as one could appreciate rime and rhythm 
of poetry in a language which he did not understand. 
But as it is necessary to know the meaning in order to 
acquire the essential value of poetry, so it is necessary 
to know the meaning in order to get the essential value of 
statuary. An individual who did not understand the 
story represented by the Laocoon Group might gain only 
the feeling that serpents should be avoided. 

There are several stories which the Laocoon Group may 
represent, but the same essential idea runs through them 
all. The story most common now is given by Vergil. 1 
Laocoon, a priest of Apollo, advised against taking the 
wooden horse of Ulysses within the walls of Troy, and 
gave expression to his feelings by hurling a spear against 
the horse. In this way, Laocoon opposed the gods who 
were supporting the strategy. As a punishment, two 
serpents came from the sea, and, when the father was 
making a sacrifice, attacked the two sons. Suddenly 
apprised of what was taking place, Laocoon rushed to 
1 Mneid, Book II. 



History and the Fine- Arts 229 

rescue his sons, but was caught with them in the deadly 
coils. An earlier story makes Laocoon suffer because 
he had desecrated the temple of Apollo, and thus brought 
the disfavor of the god upon him. Still another story is 
that Laocoon offended Apollo by marrying against the 
will of the god. In all of these accounts, however, there 
is the one essential idea that Laocoon was punished 
because he opposed the will of some supernatural power. 

The statue thrills the observer with the horror of the 
situation as he sees the agony expressed in Laocoon's 
face and realizes that the father in his death struggle is 
helpless to save either himself or his sons, upon whom his 
rash act has brought calamity. The parent's grief over 
the hopeless death struggle of his two innocent sons is 
added to the physical torture he suffers. Beauty of form 
and strength of body of those about to be destroyed add 
to the pathos of the situation. 

As the tragic scene is carried to its climax in the excited 
imagination of the observer, it stirs deeply his feeling. 
At the same time he recognizes that the punishment of 
Laocoon came as a result of offending a supernatural 
power. The will of the gods thus acquires a new* appre- 
ciation ; the observer feels the superiority of a supernatural 
power, which, as the work of art becomes universalized, 
does not necessarily mean the particular personalities in 
whom the Greeks believed, but whatever supernatural 
power the individual may recognize. As in the case of 
new value given to Christianity by the poem Cleon, not 
mere intellectual recognition of cause and effect, but the 
calling forth and transfer of strong feeling, mark the 
development of the new ideal. 



230 The Principles of Education 



Painting functions similarly to sculpture, but differs from sculp- 
ture in that it uses colors and is limited to the representation of 
one point of view. 

Painting is limited like sculpture to one unchanging 
presentation, but differs from sculpture in that it uses 
colors and is confined to two dimensions. Although 
painting can give only one point of view, it has the 
advantage of warmth of color. and of power to represent 
finer evidences of the inner life. The face of a statue is 
cold, dull, rigid ; but the face in a picture is warm and life- 
like, and reveals spiritual qualities of the person repre- 
sented. When Christianity turned the attention of 
artists from physical form to spiritual life, painting was 
used to represent that peace and beauty which God 
gives to those who do His will. The advantages of paint- 
ing over sculpture in representing natural scenery are 
obvious. Where a scene includes numerous objects and 
where color is an important factor, painting excels sculp- 
ture. 

The Sistine Madonna may illustrate how painting 
guides to a new ideal. This picture excites complex 
appreciation which includes that of noble womanly 
character, the innocence and helplessness of infancy, 
mother's love, religious value suggested by the halo and 
by the angel faces, and sensuous beauty of form and color. 
This complex feeling of value is transferred to the Ma- 
donna, who appears to be the means through which these 
values have been made incarnate. 

Turner's The Slave Ship pictures the sun about to give 
over to the darkness of night a scene freighted with horror. 
In the distance is a storm-battered slave ship, and nearer 



History and the Fine Arts 231 

by, in the water, are manacled human beings, helpless 
amid stormy waves and fierce denizens of the sea. As 
one's soul is stirred with horror, the feeling is carried over 
to slavery, which is felt to be the cause of it all. Harriet 
Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin develops an aversion 
to slavery by making it appear in a series of incidents as 
the cause of great human suffering; Turner's The Slave 
Skip exerts the same kind of influence, but is confined 
to the representation of one incident. While the picture 
has the disadvantage of telling the story through only one 
incident, it has the great advantage of making a concrete 
vivid appeal to the imagination rather than one dependent 
upon words more or less general in meaning, and also the 
advantage of presenting all at once elements of feeling 
which the novel must give in successive passages. 

Studies in still life have a function similar to that of 
nature poetry. Appreciations of natural beauty ac- 
centuated in the picture with its satisfying proportions 
and delightful color harmonies, ideals suggestive of rest, 
peace, freedom, and of the joy and mystery of life, give 
richer value to nature about us, so that we live in the 
presence of these greater worths and are practically 
affected by them. 

VI 

Architecture calls forth feelings of worth by beauty of form and 
by the values of ideals it symbolizes. It also suggests that to 
which the worth is transferred, as, for example, religious faith in 
the case of a magnificent cathedral. 

Architecture is usually included among the fine arts, 
although it borders closely upon the " useful " arts. The 
palace and the temple are to shelter people as well as to 
incite appreciation. Buildings may be useful, however, 



232 The Principles of Education 

without appealing to appreciation, and such appeal is, 
therefore, something in addition to this usefulness. 

Architecture calls forth a feeling of appreciation by 
equalizing conflicts of forces; it is adapted to express 
power of mere material objects, as sculpture is adapted 
to express power of the human body, and painting and 
music, spiritual power. A column, because of its rigidity, 
resists the force of gravity in what it supports. A column 
that is unnecessarily massive with relation to the weight 
of the superstructure, or is so slender as to give the im- 
pression of weakness, causes a feeling of dissatisfaction. 
In the one case, there appears to be waste of energy, and 
in the other, there appears to be strain. A column 
should be of greatest diameter in the middle where the 
greatest strength is needed, and the superstructure should 
be placed upon it so that the weight can be supported 
to the greatest advantage. A favorable feeling is caused 
when forces are nicely balanced. Stability gives a feeling 
of satisfaction. This is true not only of columns, but of 
all architectural forms. 

Our feelings with regard to equalization of forces are 
due to the tendency to personalize objects, to read our 
experiences into them. Our feeling of resistance against 
opposing objects is essential to the idea of force which 
we read into other objects. We sympathetically imagine 
that a column supporting too heavy a superstructure is 
strained with the burden. The author once saw on an 
elaborately decorated theater a heavy cornice supported 
by figures of men in horizontal position with feet against 
the wall and backs against the cornice. This appeared 
inartistic, because it gave the observer, through sympathy 
with the figures, an annoying feeling of instability. He 
did not stop to reason about it ; he immediately felt it. 



History and the Fine Arts 233 

This personalizing excites some appreciation even for 
products of the '* useful " arts. For this reason, the nice 
adjustments of forces in the modern locomotive or auto- 
mobile excite greater appreciation than do the clumsy 
adjustments in the earlier types. 

Our own personal feelings in the use of the architectural 
product also may appear. The curves of an ax handle 
would be just as graceful, if reversed, but would give one 
a feeling of dissatisfaction, because they would not be 
adapted to the use intended. It would be uncomfortable 
to use such an ax handle. For the same reason, a dis- 
proportionately small entrance to a building, or a ceiling 
that appears to be too low, gives an unpleasant feeling. 

Largeness and durability are also factors of appreciation 
of architectural work. A great cathedral is more impres- 
sive than an exact copy of it in the form of a small model. 
The forces involved are greater in the former instance. 
Permanence and strength make stone more effective 
material than wood, not only for the sake of the building, 
but also for the sake of appreciation. 

In addition to the appreciation excited by beauty of 
form, architecture gives appreciation by symbolizing 
ideals. Ionian, Dorian, Attic, Queen Anne, Colonial, 
— all of these types are symbolic of past civilizations and 
rich, therefore, in ideal associations. When Napoleon 
exclaimed, " Soldiers, from yonder pyramids forty cen- 
turies look down upon you," he felt an appreciation of the 
pyramids for what they symbolized, as well as for their 
durable material, stable form, and magnificent size. 

Whatever may be the causes of appreciation, — whether 
satisfactory proportion, size, or ideals symbolized, — is 
carried over to the social institution or whatever else the 
observer is led to associate with the appreciated values 



234 The Principles of Education 

as a means of realizing them. A massive stone building 
causes a feeling of security which may be transferred to 
the bank or trust company it shelters ; a stately temple 
of justice arouses feelings of dignity and power which may 
be transferred to the courts; a magnificent cathedral 
may in like manner make religious faith appear more 
noble and authoritative. Architecture is thus a perma- 
nent guide for the developing of feelings of worth which 
create new ideals. 

VII 

Music is especially strong in direct appeal to feeling, but is more or 
less indefinite in suggesting that to which appreciation is trans- 
ferred. 

Music is less symbolic than literature, painting, and 
sculpture, and is stronger than other fine arts in direct 
appeal to feeling. The murmuring of the brook, the 
whispering of leaves, the song of the bird, the cry of the 
wolf, the roar of waves, the crash of thunder, and many 
sounds of the human voice, impress one with a wide range 
of feelings. They are the language of nature that speaks 
directly to the heart of man. 

As in the case of the other fine arts, appreciation of a 
musical composition is built up through the uniting of 
appreciated elements. Just as words are combined into 
meaningful sentences and paragraphs, so musical tones 
are combined into larger units. In the degree that these 
combinations are not felt, the music becomes a confusion 
of tones. As a key sentence guides the reader to the 
appreciation of the unity of a paragraph, so the motif, 
made prominent in its simplicity at the beginning of a 
complex musical composition, guides the hearer to appre- 
ciate the unity of tones. Now one part and now another 



History and the Fine Arts 235 

of the harmonic structure is made to stand out until 
recognized, so that its effect can be felt when it is less 
accentuated in a manifold elaboration of tones later. 

In addition to making a direct appeal, music increases 
appreciation by calling to consciousness strong ideals 
which it symbolizes. His country's national anthem 
heard by a patriot in a foreign land is a forceful example of 
this. Music which one has associated with happy days of 
one's youth in home and church gains an enhanced value 
due to what it represents. The wedding march and 
funeral dirge excite stronger feeling on account of what 
they symbolize. Symbolization is most frequently due 
to songs, in which the music is expressed in the form of 
words. The words carry with them not only tones, but 
ideals also, as in war and love songs, and in religious 
hymns. 

In accordance with the law controlling the making of 
new purposes, feelings of value excited by music are 
carried over to whatever is intimately associated with 
them. In a song, words symbolize the idea that receives 
the new value. When music and poetry are thus com- 
bined, not only is there a double source of appreciation, 
but the transfer of feeling is more directly guided. Value 
may be given to the place to which one must go in order 
to hear the music, as the church, the school, the theater, 
or the home. Ideas to receive new values may be sug- 
gested by the music itself ; for, as imagination runs free, 
moods created by the music bring to mind ideas that pre- 
viously have been associated with these moods. 

The purpose-giving influence of music has been recog- 
nized in a practical way^from the time of primitive man, 
who strengthened his courage with the war song and 
developed his religious awe for mystic divinities by the 



236 The Principles of Education 

religious chant. Early Athenians made much use of 
music to develop ideals of patriotism and religion in the 
youths preparing for citizenship. For centuries, music 
was prominent in religious education. To-day in many 
practical ways the fact appears that music not only in- 
tensifies our joys and soothes our sorrows, but also gives 
authority to many purposes, which take leadership in 
action. 

VIII 

In the moving picture, a new medium for artistic expression has 
been found. 

A new medium for artistic expression has appeared in 
the moving picture, which is widely influential in guiding 
the development of ideals. Owing to the newness of this 
medium, the full range of its possibilities has not yet 
been discovered. Although it is associated with the 
expression of various forms of literature on the stage, its 
possibilities are different. Compared with the spoken 
drama, it is greatly limited in the use of words, but it has 
far greater possibilities in the scope of action directly 
presented, in the rapidity with which scenes are changed, 
and in the power to stress essential parts of a complex 
scene by means of the " close-up/' The law controlling 
the development of new purposes and the applications of 
it made in the discussion of literature and painting, sug- 
gest how the moving picture may guide in forming new 
ideals. 



History and the Fine Arts 237 



IX 

Because of the freedom of the fine arts in making associations, 
they may be perverted so as to give false values, which become 
subversive of human welfare. The same work of art may influence 
two persons in quite different ways. 

The freedom of the fine arts in selecting appreciations 
of worth and ideas to which these feelings are transferred, 
is beset with certain dangers. Relations of means and 
ends may be stated or suggested when internal probability 
or necessity does not justify such connections. As the 
fine arts appeal to feeling rather than to critical rational 
judgment, the subtle transfer of feeling from the end to 
some idea associated with it, may take place without the 
individual's discovering that his association is not justi- 
fiable and that the resulting appreciation is injurious. 
There is danger, therefore, that the function of fine arts 
be perverted so that they give false values, which become 
subversive of human welfare when they are made guides of 
action. This is the case when admiration of physical 
bravery is associated with deeds of an outlaw, as in some 
thrilling novels written for boys. War and peace become 
unduly glorified as valuable in themselves by association 
with appreciations that misrepresent the value of the one 
or the other. The creation of false values in this way 
is a common occurrence. 

In painting, sculpture, and music, the character of the 
appreciation excited and that of the idea which receives 
the new value are dependent more or less upon suggestion. 
Because different appreciations and ideas are called forth 
by suggestion, one person may feel that a work of art is 
immoral in its influence, while another may feel that the 
same work of art is moral. Both judgments may be 



238 The Principles of Education 

right for the individuals concerned. The influence upon 
any person or group of persons cannot be determined until 
what is suggested in each case is known. 



In showing how history and the several fine arts connect re- 
actions with fundamental systems of habits, natural science gives 
the physical counterpart of the ways in which they create feelings 
of value and associate with them means of control. " 

Let us now consider history and the fine arts from the 
point of view of natural science. Since history and the 
fine arts are purpose-giving subject matter, their nature, 
from the materialistic point of view, may be found in 
the natural science explanation of how new purposes are 
made. They give stimuli which tend to open fundamental 
channels of expression, and, at the same time, open less 
important channels so that the latter become united with 
the former. When the otherwise less important reaction 
has become an integral part of a fundamental system of 
habits, a check in it is a check in the system, and is, 
therefore, accompanied by the stronger feeling of value 
that goes with the system. 

.Before the War of 1812, shipping activities in the New 
England States were important in the adjustment of 
organisms to the environment. The War of 1812 checked 
the ocean commerce and thereby interfered with the 
fundamental habits acquired by the people of New Eng- 
land in their adjustment to environment. In the reaction 
to this new situation, certain acts of collecting tariff on 
imported goods were developed in accordance with the 
process through which new reactions are formed. The 
more fundamental habits of living functioned better, 
when, as a result of the tariff, activities of manufacturing 



History and the Fine Arts 239 

were developed. In time, collecting a tariff became fixed 
as a social habit and was transmitted in a greater or less 
degree through imitation, the younger generation con- 
tinuing what the older had begun. In the degree that 
it was transmitted through imitation, it became isolated 
from the system of habits in connection with which it was 
developed. History restores this connection. On the 
side of consciousness, the activity of collecting the tariff 
is a fact, and the system of habits with which the tariff 
is connected appears as a purpose. Connecting reactions 
with habits in relation to which they have developed, 
is paralleled on the side of consciousness by the experience 
of interpreting facts. When the reaction has been 
reunited with the more fundamental system of habits, 
tension in the reaction is paralleled in consciousness by a 
feeling of value that belongs to the system of habits of 
which the reaction is now an integral part. A check in it 
is a check in the whole system of habits. 

As time passed, situations changed and new difficulties 
arose in adjustment, so collecting a tariff was modified 
and connected with other habits in reaction to environ- 
ment. These habits represent on the side of consciousness 
new purposes which came in to modify the tariff. It is 
not necessary to give them in detail here, because in 
making these new connections, history merely repeats 
what has been explained in the preceding paragraph as 
the parallel of interpretation. 

In Browning's Cleon, the fundamental system of 
habits having to do with self-preservation is stimulated 
under conditions that make its conscious accompani- 
ments appear, and, at the same time, activities peculiar to 
Christianity are similarly stimulated. The partly opened 
channels run together so that activities represented by 



240 The Principles of Education 

Christianity become a part of the more fundamental sys- 
tem of habits. Stimulating the system of habits cor- 
responds to creating an appreciation, and connecting 
activities of Christianity with it corresponds to associat- 
ing these activities as means to the appreciated end. If 
the activities of Christianity are checked, the conscious 
parallel now becomes that of the value of the whole 
system of habits ; for the check in the activity is a check 
in the system of which it is now an integral part. This 
is the parallel of the transference of value. 

In the play Hamlet, stimuli are such as to open in a 
greater or less degree strongly fixed channels of response 
that would turn one away from suffering and death. 
On the mental side, this corresponds to inciting certain 
appreciations of value. Then nervous connections neces- 
sary for prompt action are associated with these habits 
as necessary to their proper functioning.* This corre- 
sponds to associating prompt action, the opposite of 
procrastination, with the value as the means of realiz- 
ing it. Afterwards, when prompt action is checked, the 
mental accompaniment is that which belongs to the more 
fundamental system with which it has been connected; 
for checking this particular reaction now is checking the 
whole system of which it is a part. 

The difference between history and the fine arts is 
that history gives stimuli connecting only those channels 
which have been connected at one time or another in 
organisms of earlier generations, whereas the fine arts may 
give stimuli which make connections that have not existed 
in organisms of earlier generations. The fine arts are dis- 
tinguished one from another by the differences in the 
kinds of stimuli they give, as words, tones, and colors, 
and by the consequent differences in the ways in which 



History and the Fine Arts 241 

they open channels of fundamental habits and connect 
particular reactions with these channels. 

When the fine arts, in modifying the complex automatic 
switchboard of the brain, do not organize reactions in 
ways to give better adjustment, but, on the contrary, 
connect particular channels of reaction and fundamental 
systems of habits so as to interfere with adjustment, the 
physical parallel of an immoral influence appears. The 
reader of an immoral novel or the observer of an immoral 
moving picture may, through wrong organization of 
channels of response, react in ways that bring injurious 
consequences. Because the fine arts are not limited, as 
is history, to connections that, at one time or another, have 
actually been made and accepted in social practice, it is 
easily possible for them to make connections that interfere 
with adjustment. Because of the fact that stimuli given 
by some fine arts, as sculpture, painting, and music, 
may excite, as a result of previous influences, quite dif- 
ferent tendencies to response in different organisms, the 
same work of art may be beneficial to one organism and 
injurious to another. 

REFERENCES 

Robinson, J. H., The New History, 1912, pp. 132-153. (Shows 

what kind of history is most valuable to the common man.) 
Judd, C. H., Psychology of High-School Subjects, 1915, pp. 370-391. 

(Discusses history from the point of view of the psychologist.) 
Fairchild, A. H. R., The Making of Poetry, 1912, pp. 155-184. 

(Explains the nature of poetry.) 
Gordon, K., Esthetics, 1909, Chs. XI-XVII, pp. 195-294. (These 

chapters are devoted respectively to a discussion of architecture, 

sculpture, painting, language as an art medium, poetry, the 

drama, and prose forms.) 
De Garmo, C, Aesthetic Education, 1913, pp. 1-156. (Students 

especially interested in the fine arts will find valuable material 



242 The Principles of Education 

in this book. Pages 155-156 contain a list of books valuable 
for collateral study.) 
Parker, Db W. H., The Principles of Esthetics, 1920, Chs. VI- 
XV. (Discusses the underlying criteria by which standards in art 
are developed.) 

PROBLEMS 

1. Should the achievements in science and industry have a less 
important place in our school history than the achievements in war ? 

2. In a continued story in a magazine, the later instalments 
are sometimes preceded by a summary of the earlier part of the 
story. Show that the function of history is analogous to the function 
of this summary. 

3. In the professional training of teachers, what is the value 
of the history of education? 

4. Find in some textbook in history a section that is largely factual. 

5. May history appropriately be called "social memory"? Ex- 
plain. 

6. In what important ways do you believe the content of the 
history courses you studied in the high school could have been im- 
proved ? 

7. How could your study of literature in the high school have 
been made more profitable to you? 

8. Why is it important to develop in children a taste for litera- 
ture and other fine arts? 

9. Having selected three poems and three pictures, show what 
purpose is enriched by each and how this enrichment is caused. 

10. Show that in the Twenty-Third Psalm or in some other work 
of art the idea to which ideal value is to be transferred is the basis 
of the unity of the work of art. 

11. Do you believe that in addition to training the pupils to sing, 
the public school should, through courses designed especially for the 
purpose, develop in them an appreciation of the best music, instru- 
mental as well as vocal? Explain. 

12. ' Criticize the following: "The psychological purpose of 
aesthetic education . . . is to promote the pure, unselfish joy of life, 
to enable us to see and appreciate the beautiful wherever it exists, 
and when possible to produce it where it is not, but should be." 

13. Was the moral influence of some " picture show " you attended 
recently good or bad? Explain. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE NATURE OF PATTERNS FOR CONTROL - 
THE SCIENCES 

The function of the sciences is to describe and explain in the 
simplest manner the behavior of things, in order that these 
things may be used most effectively in control. This descrip- 
tion and explanation require the abstracting of things from 
values, the considering of special aspects of these things, the 
reducing of them to elements, and the finding, on the basis of 
efficient causation or logical cogency, of laws descriptive of how 
these elements behave singly or in combination. The fact 
that the sciences are outgrowths of ordinary experience accounts 
for the following: their logical classifications of phenomena 
are normally also "psychological" ; the pure sciences are an inter- 
mediate stage in the development of control and are supple- 
mented by the "applied sciences"; the normal approach to the 
pure sciences begins with practical activities. The classifica- 
tion of the sciences develops slowly and can never be complete. 
The beliefs that the sciences give insight into reality or speak 
authoritatively about ultimate values, are erroneous. 



The function of the sciences is to describe in the simplest manner 
the behavior of things, in order that these things may be used most 
effectively in control. Each science (1) considers things apart 
from all feelings of value ; (2) deals with only one aspect of them ; 
(3) reduces them, from its special point of view, to their simplest 
parts, or elements ; and (4) finds laws which describe how these 
elements behave, both separately and in combination. 

The sciences are the most valuable guides in developing 
means of control. They give control in the form of widely 

243 



244 The Principles of Education 

useful organized principles rather than in the form of 
a multiplicity of isolated facts; they increase rapidly 
man's power over nature by substituting a definite method 
of investigation for the trial and error method of primitive 
man. As Karl Pearson says, " In the capacity he has 
evolved for resuming vast ranges of phenomena in brief 
scientific formulae in his knowledge of natural law, and 
the foresight this knowledge gives him, lie the sources of 
man's victory over other forms of life, from the brute 
power of the wild beast to the subtle power of the micro- 
scopic bacillus of some dread disease." To find more 
definitely how sciences guide in developing control, is the 
problem of this chapter. 

Things of the world act in ways of their own. They 
are rigidly stubborn in nature; they always, under the 
same conditions, act persistently in the same ways. 
This fact is termed the uniformity of nature. Water 
expands when it freezes and ice absorbs heat when it 
melts ; light and sound vary in intensity with the square 
of the distance ; a grain of corn in the warm moist earth 
sprouts into a plant. A congress of nations could not 
make them do differently. 

Man can make things work for him only by finding 
out just what they do and under what conditions they act. 
Then he can set to work those which do what he desires 
done. The farmer must know how seed and soil act; 
the cook must know how flour and yeast behave; the 
builder of locomotives must know what steam will do 
under various conditions; the maker of electrical appli- 
ances must understand the behavior of electricity; the 
debater must know the power of premises to compel 
conclusions ; a man who desires to do his duty must know 
the effects upon life of various kinds of conduct. In 



The Sciences 245 

every line of his activity, man can get the assistance of 
things only by letting them work for him in their own 
peculiar ways. 

The province of the sciences is to describe and explain 
in the simplest manner the activities of things considered 
by themselves, so that we can most easily understand 
how to make use of these things in attaining our purposes. 
In the words of Miinsterberg, 

If we want to make use of things in the world, we must know 
what they are in themselves, not only what they mean to us and 
what they are for our will, but what they are independent of us and 
our interests. Hence, we must look on the chaos of things with the 
special aim of finding out what they themselves contribute to our 
experience and how they hang together without reference to us. To 
do this, we must consider them as objects, which are cut loose from 
our will and interest. As soon, as we deal with the things of life 
as if they were nothing but mere objects, they interest us only with 
reference to their connection. Their relation to us, to our feeling 
and will, is then ignored and omitted. We call this connection of 
the things among one another causality. 1 

This simplicity in description and explanation requires 
(1) that things having the same characteristics be treated, 
not as individuals, but as a class, so that one descriptive 
and explanatory statement will do for a number of things ; 
it requires also (2) that this statement be as simple as 
possible. As the number of things in a class is increased, 
the control given by one scientific formulation is in- 
creased ; as the description of the class is made simpler, it 
is more easily understood. As Karl Pearson says, 

By the formation of conceptions, which may or may not have 
perceptual equivalents in the sphere of sense-impression, the scientist 

1 Miinsterberg, Hugo, Psychology and the Teacher, pp. 28-29. 
(This separation of things from purposes is, however, relative rather 
than absolute.) 



246 The Principles of Education 

is able to classify and compare phenomena. From their classification 
he passes to formulae or scientific laws describing their sequences 
and relationships. The wider the range of phenomena embraced, and 
the simpler the statement of the law, the more nearly we consider that 
he has reached a "fundamental law of nature." The progress of 
science lies in the continual discovery of more and more comprehen- 
sive formulae, by the aid of which we can classify the relationships 
and sequences of more and more extensive groups of phenomena. 
The earlier formulae are not necessarily wrong, they are merely 
replaced by others which in briefer language describe more facts. 1 

Again, to use the words of Professor Santayana, 

But the hope of science, a hope which is supported by every success 
it scores, is that a simpler law than has yet been discovered will be 
found to connect units subtler than those yet known ; and that in 
these finer terms the universal mechanism may be exhaustively 
rendered. 2 \ 

Things come usually in the form of bundles; they 
are composite in nature and complex in activity. Not 
many composite things can be included as such in the 
same class for description, because, although they may 
be similar in some particulars, they usually differ in 
others ; and even if they were included in the same class, 
the complexity of their activities would make simple 
description impossible. Sciences must proceed, therefore, 
in accordance with the fable that sticks may be broken 
one at a time when they cannot be broken together in a 
bundle. The sciences can fulfill their mission only when 
they make the task of description and explanation as 
easy as possible by separating complex things into the 
simplest elements and by taking account of these ele- 

1 Pearson, Karl, The Grammar of Science, 1911, pp. 96-97. The 
italics are mine. 

2 Santayana, G., The Life of Reason — Reason in Science, p. 33. 



The Sciences 247 

ments one at a time. This fact is illustrated by Hobhouse 
when he says : 

The mind, with all its powers, is incapable of grasping the whole 
even of the "flower in the crannied wall." It deals with it first under 
this aspect, and then under that — as a thing of beauty, as suggestive 
of a Wordsworthian sonnet, as injurious to the structure of the wall, 
as a composita, as consisting mainly of carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, 
and nitrogen in certain proportions, as decomposing so many cubic 
feet of carbonic acid per diem under the influence of sunlight. And 
whichever aspect we like to take we are pretty sure to leave out the 
rest. The sonnet would be deranged by a thought of the carbonic 
acid. And yet somehow all these aspects belong to the flower. 
The whole, which is the real, contains or presents them all and many 
more. And so we learn our first lesson about thought, that to grasp 
anything at all we must leave out the greater part of it. 1 

In simplifying material for special study, a science 
(1) separates things from all feelings of value which one 
may have for them, (2) separates one aspect from all 
other aspects of the things it considers, and (3) divides 
these things, from this special point of view, into the 
simplest parts, or elements. This process of scientific 
method is abstraction, a term which comes from the 
Latin word meaning " to draw away." By abstraction, we 
take away from a thing in imagination that which cannot 
be taken away from it in reality. Whiteness, for instance, 
cannot exist by itself, but always appears as the color of 
some object ; yet we can consider whiteness in imagination 
as though it had a separate existence. 

The ordinary way of examining a complex thing, we have 
learned, is to take it apart and put it together again. 
This is the method used by the scientist in dealing with 
the intricate things in nature just as it is the method used 
by the child in trying to understand some mechanical 
1 Quoted by J. Welton, The Logical Bases of Education, p. 64. 



248 The Principles of Education 

toy. The simplest parts, or elements, are found, and then 
the ways in which these elements combine are discovered. 
In chemistry, for example, material things are separated 
into such elements as oxygen, hydrogen, and carbon, and 
then the ways in which these elements combine to form 
the many things in nature are described. Descriptions 
of how elements go together, of how they act singly and 
in combination when uniting, form the laws of nature. 

(1) In our real world, things are always connected with 
purposes. We give attention to them when we use them 
in satisfying our desires. Because of their relation to 
purposes, things acquire some value recognized imme- 
diately through feelings of appreciation. With these 
values, the sciences are not concerned. The province of 
the sciences, as we have learned, is to find how things act 
when taken by themselves, and shuts out at once, there- 
fore, all consideration of how persons may feel about 
these things. Whenever feelings of value intrude upon 
a field of science, they become mischief-makers; they 
create prejudices, confuse the issue, encumber thought. 
The scientist must be an unprejudiced observer of things ; 
he must see what takes place, but feel no preference 
whatever for one thing above another. Personally he 
may prefer fragrant flowers to stinking weeds, and words 
of wisdom to the babblings of idiocy ; but as botanist or 
psychologist he must be absolutely impartial. 1 

(2) After things have been abstracted from the values 
we feel for them, they are still very complex. For ex- 
ample, corn, although we may not at the time desire to 
use it in any way, may be considered as seed, as food, as 
a commodity to be sold, as a material for making alcohol, 
as a cargo for a ship, etc. Further abstraction, or analysis 

1 Cf. Miinsterberg, Hugo, Psychology and the Teacher, p. 30. 



The Sciences 249 

in imagination, must be made. Whether one thing 
appears before or after another, the length of time between 
them, differences in the sizes and relative positions of 
things in space, are important considerations affecting 
causal relations. When such time and space relations 
are considered by themselves, the problem becomes much 
simpler than it would be, if the particular natures of things 
in time and space were considered simultaneously with 
these relations. Time and space abstracted from all 
content mark the field of mathematics. Light, heat, 
sound, and other forms of energy manifested in things, 
also may be considered by themselves. This abstraction 
marks the field of physics. Qualitative changes in things 
which affect their properties as forms of matter, are 
abstracted for study by the science of chemistry. Changes 
due to life in organic matter mark another abstract field 
for study, the field of biology. In grammar and logic, 
forms of language and of reasoning respectively are ab- 
stracted from content, so that investigation will not be 
encumbered by the particular meanings of sentences and 
arguments. Each of these fields may, in turn, be sub- 
divided by further abstraction. The field of mathe- 
matics may be subdivided into -those of arithmetic, 
algebra, geometry, etc. ; the field of physics may be 
subdivided into those of mechanics, heat, light, sound, 
and electricity; the field of biology may be subdivided 
into those of botany and zoology. 

(3) When all personal preferences have been eliminated 
and certain aspects of things have been abstracted for 
investigation, still further analysis is necessary for the 
sake of simplicity. Sciences seek, therefore, the elements 
within their respective fields. In the elements, the 
simplest forms are reached; there is no immediate pos- 



250 The Principles of Education 

sibility of further subdivision. If further subdivision 
were possible, it would mean that an element has not 
been found. Thus mathematics seeks axioms ; physics, 
molecules; chemistry, atoms; and grammar, parts of 
speech. Because the simplest particle of matter that 
can be seen even with the aid of the most powerful micro- 
scope is still divisible, physics and chemistry have been 
compelled to invent hypothetical molecules and atoms, 
which have never been seen by anybody and are purely 
inferential though well established. From the atom, even 
a smaller unit, the electron, has been separated in the 
service of certain phases of science. 

Scientific analysis not only simplifies objects, but also 
greatly reduces in number the classes of objects to be 
described. Elimination of personal preferences does 
away with many classifications that have no significance 
for science. A classification of plants on the basis of some 
investigator's personal preferences for their beauty, odor, 
or some sentimental value would be useless, because 
individuals differ in such preferences. Countless objects 
differing greatly in other respects may have in common 
some aspects which may be taken together for description. 
When we have a certain number of characteristics to deal 
with, the larger the number of characteristics included 
in each of the various classes for description, the smaller 
is the number of classes for description. All material 
things are in time and space, manifest forms of energy, 
and undergo qualitative changes. Descriptions included 
in mathematics, physics, and chemistry may, therefore, 
apply to all of these things and thus reduce the number 
of classes to be considered. All organic matter may 
undergo changes due to life, which are described in biology. 
Language and reasoning have respectively common 



The Sciences 251 

characteristics which may be treated by a single science 
as grammar or logic. Finding the elements still further 
reduces the number of classes to be described. Twenty- 
six letters spell all the words of the language; about 
eighty chemical elements are responsible for all the quali- 
tative differences in material things ; nine parts of speech 
make all the sentences uttered by man. 

When elements have been reached, the next step is 
to find how they behave both separately and in combina- 
tion. Here their stubbornness is an advantage to the 
scientist ; for they always behave in the same ways under 
the same conditions. Observation has revealed so many 
instances of this that the scientist assumes it to be uni- 
versally true. If there were no such uniformity of nature, 
if things behaved in capricious ways, descriptions of their 
behavior at one time would be of no use in setting them 
to work later. If, under the same conditions, hydrogen 
and oxygen, when united in the proportion of two volumes 
to one, might form water or milk; if iron might be 
attracted to the earth or repelled by the earth ; if sound 
might become more intense or less intense with the dis- 
tance ; if bread might be a food or a poison ; if the same 
argument might force conviction or be absurd; — if, in 
every instance, nature were not uniform, of what use 
would descriptions of the behavior of things be? Only 
when man knows with certainty what they will do can he 
successfully set them to work for him. 

Descriptions of these uniformities in the behavior of 
things constitute the laws of nature. The laws of nature, 
accordingly, are not like those of a state, which may or 
may not be obeyed. Nature needs no policemen or penal 
institutions to compel obedience. In so far as scientific 
laws are true, they tell, not what ought to be done, but 



252 The Principles of Education 

what was, is, and will be done, unfailingly, precisely, 
universally. When things are set to work for man in 
accordance with true scientific formulae, they never 
shirk ; they are always reliable. 

We must know not only what kind of behavior things 
manifest, but also how much they accomplish. As 
Spencer says, " Our first achievement is to foretell the 
kind of phenomena which will occur under specified 
conditions; our last achievement is to tell not only the 
kind but the amount" 1 A physician must know not 
only what kind, but also how much medicine must be 
given to bring about the desired result. Too little may 
be useless and too much may be injurious. In the appli- 
cation of chemistry to manufacturing, measuring instru- 
ments are conspicuous. Even if the desired result is 
attained when more than the necessary amount of some 
chemical is used, there is at least a waste of material. 
Some things are more effective than others, furthermore, 
in accomplishing the same kind of result. Some filaments 
in lamps give more light than others with less electricity ; 
some educational methods give greater results than others 
with less work on the part of both the pupil and the 
teacher. Measurement is necessary for determining which 
are more useful. This is obvious in the case of the lamp 
filament ; it is less obvious, but just as true, in the case 
of educational methods. Only with the use of objective 
measurement such as that made possible for hand- 
writing, arithmetic, and composition, and by various other 
methods for measuring mental abilities, can educational 
practice escape inaccurate opinion and be put on a truly 
scientific basis. Just as the phenomena of heat could not 

1 Spencer, Herbert, Essays — Scientific, Political, and Speculative, 
Vol. II, pp. 4-5. 



The Sciences 253 

be treated scientifically until the thermometer was in- 
vented, so the phenomena of education could not be 
treated scientifically until appropriate methods of objec- 
tive measurement were invented. 

Just as the scientist goes beyond direct observation in 
finding atoms and molecules as the elements of physical 
things, so he goes beyond direct observation in finding the 
laws of nature. In both cases, he gives imaginary descrip- 
tions that have been found to work satisfactorily when 
tested in the light of what he can observe. As hypotheses 
that are found to work satisfactorily when tested, laws 
of nature are man-made instruments justified by their 
usefulness. Pearson says : 

The discovery of some single statement, some brief formula from 
which the whole group of facts is seen to flow, is the work, not of a 
mere cataloguer, but of the man endowed with creative imagination. 
The single statement, the brief formula, the few words of which 
replace in our minds a wide range of relationships between isolated 
phenomena, is what we term a scientific law. 1 

Nobody has ever seen how light is transmitted in space ; 
the laws of light transmission based upon the assumption 
of ethereal vibration, are inventions made because they 
are useful in describing and explaining the phenomena of 
light. Darwin did not see directly the laws of evolution, 
but invented them through suggestions received from the 
methods of breeding plants and animals. Yes, laws of 
nature are just as truly inventions as are mechanical 
devices used in the industrial world. In both cases, 
when more effectual ones have been invented, the older 
ones are cast aside; and, to a reader of the history of 
science, the scrap heap of antiquated laws appears as 
conspicuous as the scrap heap of antiquated machines. 
1 The Grammar of Science, 1911, Pt. I, p. 31. 



254 The Principles of Education 

II 

The sciences recognize two kinds of persistent behavior in things, 
— that dependent on efficient causation and that dependent on 
logical cogency. Efficient causation is manifested only in physical 
things, and is, therefore, peculiar to physical sciences, such as 
physics, chemistry, and biology. Logical cogency is peculiar to 
sciences such as logic and mathematics, which deal with pure forms. 

In saying that the function of the sciences is to find 
the " activity "- or " behavior " of things taken by them- 
selves, we have attributed to things characteristics of the 
human will. This common and easier way of regarding 
things dates back to primitive animism, and, in the light 
of modern knowledge, is true only metaphorically. 
Pearson expresses the truth more accurately when he says 
that a scientific law is " the single statement, the brief 
formula, the few words of which replace in our minds a 
wide range of relationships between isolated phenomena." l 

The sciences recognize two kinds of persistent activity 
or behavior of things ; or, better expressed, two kinds of 
relationships among phenomena, — that dependent on 
efficient causation, as when the blow of a hammer causes 
heat, and that dependent on logical cogency, as when a 
mathematical proof compels one to accept the conclusion. 

1 A still more significant statement is given by Pearson as follows : 
"A scientific law is related to the perceptions and conceptions formed 
by the perceptive and reasoning faculties in man ; it is meaningless 
except in association with these ; it is the resume or brief expression 
of the relationships and sequences of certain groups of these percep- 
tions and conceptions, and exists only when formulated by man." 
(Opus cit., p. 82.) The truth of this statement appears in the light 
of the fact that the nature of things consists largely of meanings de- 
veloped by reason and read into sensation symbols. In order to avoid 
making the discussion of the scientific treatment of things unneces- 
sarily difficult, we have not short-circuited the relation between the 
sciences and reason by treating things as largely objectified reason. 



The Sciences 255 

Physical sciences, such as physics, chemistry, and biology, 
deal directly with the former; dialectic sciences, such as 
mathematics and logic, deal directly with the latter. 

Although the physical sciences take special abstract 
points of view, they still deal with material objects, which 
manifest physical, or efficient, causation. Through physi- 
cal causation, the heat in the firebox of a locomotive 
causes the steam pressure in the cylinder ; the steam pres- 
sure in the cylinder causes the movements of the piston 
rod ; the movements of the piston rod cause the turning of 
the wheels ; the turning of the wheels causes the movement 
of the locomotive. These changes appear one after another 
in time. The laws, or formulae, minutely describing them 
can be derived by a process of induction based on observa- 
tion of concrete facts. For this reason, there is always 
the possibility, however, that new facts which appear with 
more extended observation may invalidate the laws, or 
formulae, attained through induction. 

Scientific abstraction may, however, go so far as to 
exclude all physical objects and take separately for investi- 
gation only the forms in which they appear, such as time 
and space. Or it may go still one step further to the 
highest degree of abstraction, which deals with the forms 
of thought itself. Mathematics, formal grammar, and 
logic are examples of sciences that do not include material 
things in their abstract points of view. We have learned 
that where there are no physical objects, there can be 
no physical, or efficient, causation. Physical energy 
cannot be stored in a void, — in absolutely empty time, 
space, and forms of thought. Yet pure forms are just as 
stubborn in having their own way as are physical things ; 
relations, as in the case of pure mathematics, are un- 
alterably fixed. Twice eight is sixteen; opposite angles 



256 The Principles of Education 

are equal; and the will of no man can change these 
relations. However unwelcome a conclusion may be, 
a person must believe it, if he accepts the premises as 
true, and if he fully understands the steps in a logically 
sound argument that leads to the conclusion. The 
necessary relations in mathematics and logic are due 
to what is called logical cogency. 

Logical cogency is not passed from one thing to another 
in time as is physical causation. The series of relations 
pointed out in the several steps of a geometrical proof 
exist all at once. The steps in the proof are due merely 
to our attending to one thing after another in time. 
Similarly in logical argument, the conclusion exists in the 
meaning of the premises; there is nothing, as in the case 
of physical causation, passed on from one step to another. 
The conclusions of sciences which deal with pure forms 
impress one, moreover, as having universal validity; 
there is no feeling, as in the case of truths derived induc- 
tively in physical sciences, that further observations may 
invalidate the conclusions. Dialectic sciences have all 
the evidence in the case ; for they are essentially deduc- 
tive, arid their validity does not depend, therefore, upon 
the observation of particulars, which are infinite in 
number, but upon premises that are universal and all- 
sufficient. 

The high degree of abstraction involved in dealing 
with pure, empty forms adds to the difficulty of dialectic 
sciences. The comparative difficulty in comprehending 
highly abstract ideas becomes evident whenever we pass 
from a highly abstract conclusion to a concrete illustra- 
tion of it. 

Physical and dialectic sciences are not, however, entirely 
separate. Mathematics and logic may be used as " tools " 



The Sciences 257 

in developing physical sciences. Indeed, without the 
assistance of mathematics and logic, practically no 
progress could be made in the physical sciences. 

Ill 

If an individual acquires normal experience of the sciences, the 
logical classifications involved must be psychological for him. 
Sciences are merely "a development of that common knowledge 
acquired by the unaided senses and uncultured reason." Logical 
and psychological stand opposed to each other only in the case of an 
individual who, without taking the intermediate steps, jumps 
from a comparatively crude knowledge of control to the use of 
highly developed social patterns for control. 

In the life process of projecting purposes and realizing 
them through means of control, the latter are organized 
with reference to the purposes they serve. A person's 
pen, ink, paper, blotter, desk, chair, and lamp, are con- 
nected through his purpose of writing. His purpose of 
writing is, in turn, connected with the purpose of putting 
certain ideas in permanent form for use in teaching; 
teaching is connected with various purposes, including 
that of making an income ; the income is connected with 
many ends for which it is spent. Not only are the pen,' 
ink, paper, blotter, etc., connected with one another by 
these purposes with which they are associated, but they 
are connected also with all other things that serve the 
same purposes, — with the schoolroom in which he 
teaches, its equipment, and pupils; with investments 
used to increase his income ; with home, church, theater, 
food, clothing, and all other things for which he spends 
money. Things of his world, no matter how extensive 
and complex that world may be, are all bound together 
by his interrelated purposes ; nothing can escape such 
organization. In following these lines of connection, 



258 The Principles of Education 

no break is experienced anywhere. This organization of 
things has been termed psychological. Its bonds are 
essentially bonds of feeling, because feeling is essential 
to purpose. 

The very first step in scientific procedure dissolves 
these bonds of feeling; it abstracts things from the 
purposes they serve, and thus prepares them for classifica- 
tion with reference to what they do by themselves. Just 
as in a dictionary words are classified not according to 
the combinations in which men ordinarily use them, but 
with reference to certain characteristics of the words 
themselves, i.e. their initial letters, so in the sciences 
things are not classified according to how men use them, 
but with reference to certain characteristics peculiar to 
the things themselves. As distinguished from the psy- 
chological, such classification is termed logical. 

Because the sciences are developed in the self-active 
process, they cannot, however, escape connection with 
purposes. If a scientific investigator truly understands 
the significance of his work, it is because he has come to a 
place in personal development where he feels the need 
of such investigation for the purpose of more effectual 
use of things in control. This purpose, which marks 
the function of sciences, connects their logically organized 
contents in a normal psychological way with the whole 
realm of purposes, which unite things of the world so 
intimately and fluently. Under normal conditions, the 
logical classification is for this reason also psychological. 

If a child who has read only story books undertakes 
to read a dictionary without understanding the purpose 
which the dictionary serves, he feels no connection between 
definitions. Words which in his story books were com- 
bined in a meaningful way with no apparent breaks, now 



The Sciences 259 

appear disconnected. Sentences which led so fluently 
one to another, now appear isolated. If he is made to 
feel, however, the need of what the dictionary does, that 
it takes the place of a teacher who tells him quickly the 
meanings of unfamiliar words, and if he is led not only 
to appreciate the purpose of the dictionary but also to 
understand how it organizes words alphabetically for his 
convenience, then the contents of the dictionary become 
intimately connected with the other things in his world. 
When he meets a new word in his reading, he may use the 
dictionary and return to his reading without feeling a 
break. If he should learn elsewhere the meaning of some 
word not in his dictionary, he may make the dictionary 
more useful by inserting the word with its definition at 
the proper place in the margin. The dictionary arrange- 
ment of words which appeared at first so strange, dis- 
connected, and disconcerting, now takes its normal place 
in his experience. It has become " psychologized " for 
him. 

So it is with the scientific organization of facts. If 
the individual who has not felt the need of scientific 
analysis and classification is led abruptly into the realm 
of the sciences, things appear strange, disconnected, dis- 
concerting. The contents of the sciences do not appear 
in the natural relations of things in his daily life with its 
bonds of feeling. The several sciences appear cut off by 
themselves; they " fractionalize " his world. Between 
physics and grammar, botany and arithmetic, there seems 
to be no connection. Even within one science, groups of 
facts appear isolated. In grammar, the various parts of 
speech are grouped separately; in physiology, bones, 
muscles, and other parts of the body are similarly isolated ; 
in physics, the facts of mechanics, heat, light, sound, and 



260 The Principles of Education 

electricity are kept apart one from another. He has 
never before met facts classified and pigeonholed in this 
way. The logical classification appears to him as some- 
thing quite different from the normal, or psychological, 
one. But when the individual, in passing from the logical 
to the psychological classification, has been led to appre- 
ciate the purpose of the sciences and to understand the 
method by which they give better control over the activ- 
ities of his daily life, this break between the logical and 
the psychological classifications disappears. Sciences 
take their normal place in his world, which is interrelated 
by bonds of purpose. The logical method of the sciences 
has now become psychological for him. 

Unless a science does thus become psychological for 
the individual, it cannot, indeed, be logical for him; 
because the true significance of the groupings of facts 
depends upon the purpose for which these groupings 
were made and are used. In a word, the individual to 
whom a science is not psychological misses the logic 
of its classifications, and, therefore, misses everything 
that makes it science. 

When we view the sciences from the wider perspective 
of their social development, the psychological and logical 
organizations of things do not appear incongruous. They 
stand opposed to each other only in the experience of 
some individual who, without taking the intermediate 
steps, jumps from a comparatively crude experience of 
control to the use of social patterns for highly developed 
experience, as in the case of a pupil who with a meagre 
knowledge of natural phenomena begins the study of a 
logically organized textbook in chemistry. The omission 
of these intermediate steps makes the break appear 
between the psychological and logical. The advanced 



The Sciences 261 

patterns do not have an appropriate basis in his experience, 
and give, therefore, abnormal results. 

The sciences, to use the words of Spencer, are "a 
development of that common knowledge acquired by 
the unaided senses and uncultured reason." 1 They 
arose historically when practical difficulties made men 
feel the need of better control. When the Nile overflowed 
its banks and washed away landmarks, geometry was de- 
vised for the practical purpose of redistributing the land. 
To regulate the dates of religious festivals and to fix times 
for agricultural operations, astronomy was devised. As 
Spencer says, " How to fix the religious festivals ; when to 
sow; how to weigh commodities; in what manner to 
measure ground; were purely practical questions out of 
which arose astronomy, mechanics, geometry." 2 Scientific 
method is not something externally imposed upon the mind 
to guide its investigations, but merely a recognition of the 
necessary ways in which the mind works in developing 
means of control. When these ways are known, they 
can be followed deliberately, thus giving the best results 
with the least expenditure of thought. There is no 
break, therefore, in going from the uncultured to the 
cultured reason. Nor is there a break in going from the 
unaided to the aided senses. Seeing with a telescope 
and microscope is not essentially different from seeing 
with the naked eye. The only difference is one of dis- 
tinctness and minuteness of vision. In primitive times, 
aids to the senses appeared in such variable standards of 
measurement as the length of a man's foot, arm, or step, 
the width of his hand, the breadth of grains of barley, 
the weight of grains of wheat, the length of a day, and the 

1 Spencer, Herbert, Essays — Scientific, Political, and Speculative^ 
Vol. II, p. 29. 2 Spencer, Herbert, opus cit., p. 69. 



262 The Principles of Education 

duration of the cycle of the moon's changes. They have 
developed until, according to Marmery, " we can now 
perceive the 9,000th part of a degree in temperature, 
1,000,000th of a second in time, 1,000,000th of an inch in 
space, 1,000,000th of a gramme in weight, the presence of 
the 10,000,000th part of a gramme of a substance. We 
can in fact observe ' quantities 300,000 or 400,000 times 
as small as in the time of the Egyptians/ " * 



IV 

Social division of labor has rightly provided workers in the pure 
sciences who are not concerned with applying the results of their 
investigations to practical affairs. The pure sciences are, however, 
only intermediate steps in the social development of control, and 
are supplemented by applied sciences such as those of engineering, 
medicine, and education. 

Although sciences arose in overcoming difficulties in 
the practical life and are the outgrowth of common ex- 
perience, they could not be developed by one man or by 
one generation of men. They are the slow and difficult 
product of centuries of investigation. Aristotle and 
Bacon, who lived two thousand years apart, both contrib- 
uted to the development of scientific method. In the 
social division of labor, it was natural for men specially 
gifted in scientific research to devote their lives to such 
work. The developing of the sciences has thus become the 
task of a special class of men who are not concerned with 
applying the results of their investigations to practical 
affairs, but serve their function in the social order by 
merely finding and recording the laws of nature. They 
are limited in this way to pure sciences. 

1 Marmery, J. V., The Progress of Science, p. 268. 



The Sciences 263 

Pure sciences are, however, only an intermediate stage 
in the social development of control. The purpose which 
normally calls them into being is not fulfilled until they 
are put in the service of the practical life. They are 
put in the service of the practical life by the so-called 
applied sciences, the workers in which must understand 
not only truths established by pure sciences but also the 
practical activities in which these truths may be useful. 

The conclusions of the pure sciences, like blossoms on 
a tree, do not all bear fruit. Applied sciences must select 
those which prove to be useful, and organize them for 
practical ends. Medical science includes useful results 
of such pure sciences as anatomy, physiology, biology, 
and chemistry; agricultural science includes useful 
results of such pure sciences as botany, zoology, geology, 
and chemistry; engineering sciences involve useful con- 
clusions of various branches of mathematics, physics, 
and chemistry. In education, truths that give practical 
guidance are taken from psychology, sociology, logic, 
ethics, and other fields. The function of applied sciences 
is thus to turn pure sciences to service in the practical 
life, in which they originated. 

In view of the fact that the ultimate purpose of sciences 
is practical, should not all investigators have in view the 
practical uses to which their conclusions may be put? 
Would not this prevent waste of time with trifling matters 
and definitely guide investigations in the most useful 
directions? However important may be the scientific 
results attained by men working with direct practical 
purposes, it would be a distinct social loss to have all 
investigations conducted under such conditions. At 
best, the practical investigator can have in mind only 
comparatively few uses for testing the importance of 



264 The Principles of Education 

the truths he finds. He would be liable, therefore, to 
neglect facts which other men might recognize as very 
useful. The pure scientist, who has no interest in the 
practical application of the truths he finds, records all 
his results, so that all men, whatever may be their prac- 
tical interests, can apply what appears to be useful to 
them. Matters which may seem to be objects of mere idle 
curiosity may, furthermore, under the impartial investi- 
gations of the pure scientist, develop into truths of far- 
reaching importance. As Thomson says : 

The twitching of the legs of Galvani's frogs was studied as a theo- 
retical curiosity; who could have foretold that it pointed to teleg- 
raphy? . . . Dr. A. E. Shipley has recently called attention to 
two diagrammatic illustrations of our theme. " A few years ago no 
knowledge could seem more useless to the practical man, no research 
more futile than that which sought to distinguish between one species 
of gnat or tick and another ; yet that knowledge has rendered it pos- 
sible to open up Africa and to cut the Panama Canal." " This wit- 
ness," Mr. F. A. Dixey remarks, "is true; and it would be difficult 
to point to a more complete demonstration of the fact that natural 
knowledge pursued for its own sake, without any direct view to 
future utility, will often lead to results of the most unexpected kind 
and of the very highest practical importance." {Nature, Sept. 2, 
1909.) i 



The normal path leading an individual from unscientific expe- 
rience to a genuine understanding of the pure sciences, begins with 
the application of scientific truths to practical affairs, and passes on 
through difficulties which can be overcome only by scientific 
methods. 

Pure and applied sciences have developed hand in 
hand. The earliest scientific investigations were in the 
interest of practical affairs, and, although a place was 

1 Thomson, J. Arthur, Introduction to Science, pp. 240, 243-244. 



The Sciences 265 

made later for pure scientists in the social division of 
labor, men have been ever ready to make practical 
applications of truths established. This wider view 
reveals the normal pathway over which individuals may 
pass from common experience to the highly organized 
experience represented by pure sciences. The individual 
must understand the function of pure sciences, we have 
found, in order that he may profit by their guidance. 
Only thus can the logical organization of subject matter 
be psychological for him, and, therefore, genuinely 
meaningful. The function of the pure sciences easily 
appears to him when he approaches them through the 
application of scientific truths to practical affairs. How 
to make a fire, to ventilate a room, to repair an electric 
bell, to avoid diseases, to perform various agricultural 
operations, to detect adulterations in foods and textiles, 
— these few random problems indicate some of the many 
points of contact which the sciences, if approached from 
the practical side, may be found to have with common 
experience. In the study of such practical problems one 
eventually meets difficulties which can be overcome only 
by the use of scientific methods. When the individual 
has reached this stage in his experience, the step to pure 
sciences is interesting, significant, and easy. 

Some school courses intended to give a general intro- 
duction to the more fundamental sciences have made the 
mistake of centering discussion about common things 
such as air, fire, water, earth, rather than about activities 
such as those mentioned above. This method has three 
serious disadvantages. (1) It does not call forth strong 
practical motives, but puts the burden of interest upon 
mere curiosity. (2) It provides no criterion, such as 
importance in use, by which the more important facts 



266 The Principles of Education 

may be selected for presentation. (3) It lacks not only 
the psychological organization in which facts are arranged 
in the order needed to guide some practical activity, 
but lacks also the logical organization which groups facts, 
not according to their relations to particular 1 things, but 
according to relations existing among the facts them- 
selves. At the same time, this method does nothing to 
lessen the break between the facts of one field of science 
and those of another. 

There is a mistaken belief that mere curiosity may lead 
the individual directly into the realm of pure sciences. 
The satisfaction of curiosity, which is possessed by prim- 
itive man and even by lower animals, is no guarantee of 
scientific experience. Only when man's curiosity has 
been disciplined by experience of the need of pure sciences 
and by a knowledge of their method, does it become a 
truly scientific motive. 

. VI 

The only unity in the sciences is unity of method. As investi- 
gators mark more definitely their respective fields and reveal 
thereby the relations between their own and other nearly related 
fields, the classification of the sciences will slowly develop. Since 
things studied by the scientist ever become more complex, because 
of new meanings read into them, there will always be scientific 
developments' so new and ill-defined as to elude classification. 

Classification of the various sciences is a task so difficult 
that it has not been successfully done, although master 
minds have attempted it. As sciences develop, the 
relations among the more fundamental ones become 
better defined, but, at the same time, the task of classi- 
fication becomes more difficult, because new fields of 
investigation more .or less elusive of classification are 
opened. 



The Sciences 267 

The only unity of the sciences, as in the case of the fine 
arts, is unity of method. We have found that the fine 
arts differ one from another, because, although they 
follow the same general method, this method must be 
adapted to the different kinds of material used. Every 
science abstracts things from values, limits itself to some 
abstract phase of these things, analyzes its material into 
elements, and finds how these elements combine. The 
second abstraction, which limits each science to one 
aspect of the things considered, differentiates the various 
sciences by marking their special fields of investigation. 
If a science deals with material things, it can use efficient 
causation in its explanations ; if its field is that of time, 
space, or forms of thought abstracted from content, 
it must use logical cogency in its explanations. If the 
material is amenable to accurate measurement, the science 
is exact; if the material is amenable to only inexact 
measurement, the science is inexact. 

Since the sciences differ because the fields to which they 
apply the same general method differ, the logical classi- 
fication of the sciences depends upon the relation of 
these fields one to another. Comte imagined these fields 
arranged as a flight of steps, each step resting upon the 
one below it and supporting the one above it in what is 
termed a hierarchy. Recognizing six fundamental 
sciences, he arranged them in the following order : mathe- 
matics, astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, and 
sociology. These six steps, according to Comte, lead to 
another above them, which is the science of morals. He 
supports this organization by the argument that both in 
the order of the parts of a particular science and in the 
order of the whole body of sciences, there is a progress 
from that which is more general to that which is less 



268 The Principles of Education 

general. He claims also that this is the order in which 
these sciences originated historically. Comte is mis- 
taken with regard to both the logic and history of the 
development of the sciences. A sufficient test of his con- 
clusions, without our going into a detailed consideration 
of them, is the obvious fact that mathematics is not 
related to sociology merely through the intervening steps 
of astronomy, physics, chemistry, and biology. Mathe- 
matics is not applied to physics merely through astron- 
omy, nor is physics applied to biology merely through 
chemistry. In making hypotheses to be tested, each 
science has taken advantage of analogies with sciences 
below it in the order named ; but it is by no means limited 
exclusively to such analogies. 

In representing the relations of the sciences, a better 
analogy than the staircase is the tree. The latter, which 
appears in the common expression " branches " of science, 
is an idea of long standing. There are two main branches 
of the trunk, one representing the sciences that deal with 
forms only, and the other representing sciences that deal 
with material things. The former main division has 
two large branches, that of mathematics, which deals 
with the forms of time and space, and that of logic, which 
deals with the forms of reasoning. The latter main 
division has as its two largest branches the physical and 
the biological sciences. Out of the physical sciences come 
physics and chemistry, and out of the biological sciences 
come botany and zoology. Physics branches into me- 
chanics, sound, heat, light, electricity, and so on. 

Although the analogy of the tree has a number of points 
in its favor, it is not true in all respects. As Spencer says : 

It suggests the facts that the sciences had a common origin; 
that they have been developing simultaneously ; and that they have 



The Sciences 269 

been from time to time dividing and sub-dividing. But it fails to 
suggest the fact, that the divisions and sub-divisions thus arising do 
not remain separate, but now and again re-unite in direct and indirect 
ways. They inosculate; they severally send off and receive con- 
necting growths; and the intercommunion has been ever becom- 
ing more frequent, more intricate, more widely ramified. 1 

The use of mathematics and logic in the development of 
other sciences is a conspicuous. example of this complica- 
tion. 

As the tree of scientific knowledge grows, however, the 
more fully developed branches become more definitely- 
marked in their relations one to another. This appears 
in the relations of the sciences traced above. As we 
come to the newer growths, the relations are more and 
more obscure. This is because newer sciences are com- 
paratively undeveloped, more or less changing in nature, 
and often deal with fields that overlap. This last is 
sometimes seen in the overlapping of advanced science 
courses in university work. 

As one mind cannot comprehend all the sciences, 
organization is possible only through the cooperation of 
scientists. As investigators mark more and more defi- 
nitely the limits of their respective fields, and reveal the 
relations between their own and other nearly related 
fields, the classification of the sciences slowly develops. 
This classification will always be far behind the newer 
scientific developments ; it can never overtake all sciences. 
The chief reason for this is that as new meanings are 
found for things and read into them, these things offer new 
abstract aspects for study. This marks the essential 
truth of Pearson's statement : 

1 Spencer, Herbert, Essays — Scientific, Political, and Speculative, 
Vol. II, pp. 28-29. 



270 The Principles of Education 

Every great advance of science opens our eyes to facts which we 
had failed before to observe, and makes new demands on our powers 
of interpretation. This extension of the material of science into 
regions where our great-grandfathers could see nothing at all, or 
where they would have declared human knowledge impossible, is one 
of the most remarkable features of modern progress. Where they 
interpreted the motion of the planets of our own system, we discuss 
the chemical constitution of stars, many of which did not exist for 
them, for their telescopes could not reach them. Where they dis- 
covered the circulation of the blood, we see the physical conflict 
of living poisons within the blood, whose battles would have been 
absurdities for them. Where they found void and probably demon- 
strated to their own satisfaction that there was void, we con- 
ceive great systems in rapid motion capable of carrying energy 
through brick walls as light passes through glass. Great as the 
advance of scientific knowledge has been, it has not been greater 
than the growth of the material to be dealt with. The goal of science 
is clear — it is nothing short of the complete interpretation of the 
universe. But the goal is an ideal one — it marks the direction 
in which we move and strive, but never a stage we shall actually 
reach. The universe grows ever larger as we learn to understand more 
of our own corner of it. 1 



VII 

The belief that the sciences give insight into the essential nature, 
or reality, of things, and the belief that they give materialistic 
conceptions of life that necessarily conflict with idealism, are erro- 
neous. 

Two erroneous ideas of the nature of the sciences are 
so widely prevalent as to justify our discussing them here. 
One is that the sciences lift the veil from nature, give an 
immediate insight into the reality of things, and therefore 
reveal the absolute truth. The other idea is that the 
sciences restrict us to sordid materialistic conceptions of 
life which necessarily conflict with idealism, that they con- 

1 Pearson, Karl, The Grammar of Science, 1911, Pt. I, p. 14. 



The Sciences 271 

tradict the moral freedom of the will, point to only 
" worldly " success, and deny the immortality of the soul. 

The sciences do not give insight into the reality of 
things. They deal with all sorts of hypothetical assump- 
tions that are not known directly and that are justified 
only because they serve as guides in control. No one 
ever saw atoms, molecules, and ethereal vibrations. 
Such conceptions are accepted by the scientist as true 
because they are the conceptions that best guide him in 
the use of things. Other conceptions might give better 
control. If these are invented, the less effective ones will 
be laid aside and the new will take their places. Old 
scientific conceptions have been replaced by new ones 
over and over again. 

The laws of nature, furthermore, as formulated by the 
sciences, are man-made inventions in the interest of 
control. This fact is expressed by Pearson as follows : 

Let it be noted that in this it is not only the process of reaching 
scientific law which is mental, but that the law itself when reached 
involves an association of natural facts or phenomena with mental 
conceptions, lying quite outside the particular field of those phe- 
nomena. Without the mental conceptions the law could not be, and 
it only comes into existence when these mental conceptions are first 
associated with the phenomena. The law of gravitation is not so much 
the discovery by Newton of a rule guiding the motion of the planets as 
his invention of a method of briefly describing the sequences of sense- 
impressions, which we term planetary motion. He did this in terms of 
a purely mental conception, namely, mutual acceleration. Newton 
first brought the idea of mutual acceleration of a certain type into 
association with a certain range of phenomena, and was thus enabled 
to state a formula, which, by what we may term mental shorthand, 
resumes a vast number of observed sequences. The statement of this 
formula was not so much the discovery as the creation of the law of 
gravitation. We are thus to understand by a law of science, i.e. 
by a "law of nature," a resume in mental shorthand, which replaces 



272 The Principles of Education 

for us a lengthy description of the sequences among our sense-im- 
pressions. Law in the scientific sense is thus essentially a product of 
the human mind and has no meaning apart from man. It owes 
its existence to the creative power of his intellect. There is more 
meaning in the statement that man gives laws to Nature than in its 
converse that Nature gives laws to man. . . . The reason we find in 
natural phenomena is surely put there by the only reason of which 
we have any experience, namely, the human reason. The mind of 
man in the process of classifying phenomena and formulating natural 
law introduces the element of reason into nature, and the logic man 
finds in the universe is but the reflection of his own reasoning faculty. 1 

A person who has acquired scientific meanings reads 
them into the things of his world, just as we have found 
he reads other meanings into these things. 2 The hot 
radiator appears to the student of physics as having 
accelerated molecular vibrations, and falling objects 
seem to him to obey a law that can be expressed with 
definite mathematical formulae. The student of chem- 
istry sees in common salt a combination of sodium and 
chlorine, and fire appears to be due to the uniting of an 
inflammable and an inflaming gas. In plants and animals 
about him, the student of biology reads the meanings of 
cell life, evolution, and heredity which science has taught 
him. The further his study goes, the more reason he 
seems to find in the world, but he finds it there because 
he has first developed it himself and has then read it into 
the things about him ; he does not get his scientific truth 
through a direct insight into the real nature of things. 

That the sciences necessarily conflict with idealism 
and restrict us to sordid materialistic conceptions of life 
is another erroneous belief. The most conspicuous 
example of this error is found in the belief that the bio- 

1 Pearson, Karl, The Grammar of Science, 1911, Pt. I, pp. 86-87, 91. 
- See p. 120. 



The Sciences 273 

logical sciences, in describing and explaining materialisti- 
cally the nature of life, have final authority to deny the 
moral freedom of the will, the existence of God, and the 
immortality of the soul. When the biological sciences 
are regarded as techniques invented by man to control 
nature for the sake of realizing his ideals, it becomes clearly 
evident that these ideals in the last analysis lie beyond 
the realm of the biological sciences, which can neither 
prove nor disprove their value. In the last analysis the 
sciences are the servants of ideals, not the masters ; they 
have neither meaning nor value apart from the purposes 
which they serve. 1 

VIII 

The analogy in function between the brain and a switchboard 
has implications supporting the teleological views given above with 
regard to the essential characteristics of the sciences, the relations 
between the psychological and the logical organizations of subject 
matter, and the erroneous beliefs that the sciences reveal the 
essential natures of things and give conceptions of life that authori- 
tatively conflict with idealism. 

Let us next find how natural science explains the nature 
of the sciences. From the materialistic point of view, 
the sciences are patterns for organizing the automatic 
" switchboard " of the brain in a way that simplifies and 
makes more effective the overcoming of obstructions in 
the reaction of the organism to the environment. We 
are concerned with the general nature of the changes that 
the sciences, acquired as a social inheritance, make in the 
brain of the organism. In explaining these changes we 
are limited to analogical reasoning based upon the simi- 
larity in function between a switchboard and the brain. 
In the switchboard, the interconnections are channels 
1 See pp. 17-18. 



274 The Principles of Education 

for electricity ; in the brain, they are channels for nerve 
force. The explanations which follow are, of course, 
merely plausible implications based upon this analogy. 

When, in the adjustment of the organism to the en- 
vironment, the fundamental brain channels, involving 
those which are inborn, or instinctive, are checked in 
functioning, acquired channels of response which conduct 
nerve energy in ways that overcome these checks are 
connected with these fundamental channels. In other 
words, new reactions are formed in the process of over- 
coming the checks in the functioning of old habits. Let 
those channels which are essentially instinctive be called 
primary, and let those which are acquired in overcoming 
the checks in the functioning of these primary channels 
be called secondary. The function of the sciences is to 
organize the secondary channels for effective adjustment. 1 

Since the changes in the brain in the process of organ- 
ization under the influence of the sciences take place in 
the secondary channels, the function of which is merely 
to overcome checks in the primary channels, the individual 
in the study of the sciences is conscious of dealing only 
with means of control. If feelings of value appear, this 
scientific organization is perverted and therefore less 
effective, because the feelings of value would indicate 
that primary channels, in relation to which the feelings of 
value originate, are influencing the organization so as to 
give to some secondary channels stronger places in the 
organization than their use in overcoming checks would 
require, and that other useful channels are given rela- 
tively weaker places, with the result that the greatest 
efficiency is not secured. This interference by primary 
channels would take place if, for example, the botanist 
1 Cf. pp. 194-195. 



The Sciences 275 

because of instinctive preference would study fragrant 
flowers and neglect offensive weeds, knowledge concerning 
which is very useful in the field of botany. Accordingly, 
the fact that the sciences organize only the secondary 
channels in the brain in ways that make control most 
effective, means on the side of consciousness that the 
values felt for things are disregarded when these things 
are considered from the strictly scientific point of view. 

The responses necessary to overcome checks in reactions 
to the same thing in the environment may be various. 
In opening the way for some particular system of habits 
to function, it may be necessary that a quantity of corn, 
for example, be changed to a different place, lifted against 
the force of gravity, used in making alcohol, or planted. 
These various reactions represent the points of view from 
which various sciences regard the object. The considera- 
tion of relative position falls within the province of 
mathematics; the investigation of the manifestations of 
gravity belongs to physics ; the study of the process of 
making alcohol belongs to chemistry ; and the phenomena 
of growing corn belong to biology. The isolation of 
each of the various classes of responses is obviously an 
essential step towards the effective reorganization of the 
responses in each class. 

The next essential step in the organization of secondary 
channels of response is the reducing of them to their 
simplest forms. This step reduces the number of the kinds 
of responses, because a few simple reactions may be united 
in many combinations which as wholes are very different 
one from another. Since ideas of the meanings of things 
parallel the reactions with regard to them, this analysis 
of responses into their simplest forms corresponds to the 
analysis of things into their elements. 



276 The Principles of Education 

When the simplest forms of secondary channels for 
reaction have been isolated, the next essential step in 
the economical reorganization of responses is combining 
these simple forms in effective connections. Since re- 
actions correspond to meanings, the economical organ- 
ization of the simple channels for reaction into useful 
combinations corresponds to the consciousness of the 
ways in which elements combine ; or, in other words, it 
corresponds to the formulation of the laws of nature. 

In normal development, the brain changes gradually 
from a less to a more organized condition ; there are no 
breaks. Because ideas are the parallels of these brain 
changes, this truth is the materialistic way of explaining 
the fact that there is no break between the psychological 
and the logical classification of phenomena, if the logical 
classification develops in a normal way. This truth 
means also that the natural pathway to scientific investi- 
gation originates in the use of things for definite practical 
ends, since the organization of secondary channels for 
response is an outgrowth of the process of the adjust- 
ment of the organism to the environment, in which 
process both primary and secondary channels are in- 
volved. 

The fact that the sciences do not give insight into the 
real nature of things is supported by natural science, 
because natural science holds that the meanings of the 
things with which the sciences deal are parallels of the 
brain changes due to the responses to stimuli and not to 
direct impressions of outer realities upon the brain. 

Since the sciences organize only the secondary channels 
of response, and since, as we have learned, the experience 
of ultimate values is relative to the primary channels, 
the sciences have no authority to contradict the worth 



The Sciences 277 

felt for those ultimate ideals which give, in the last 
analysis, significance and value to human life. 

REFERENCES 

Bagley, W. C, The Educative Process, 1907, pp. 161-163. (States 
briefly the nature of science.) 

Munsterberg, H., Psychology and the Teacher, 1910, pp. 27-33. 
(States briefly the nature of science.) 

Thomson, J. A., Introduction to Science, 1911, pp. 7-248. (Discusses 
in a popular manner the scientific mood, the aim of science, scien- 
tific method, classification of the sciences, science and philosophy, 
science and art, science and religion, and the utility of science.) 

Dewey, J., How We Think, 1910, pp. 56-63. (Distinguishes between 
the psychological and the logical.) 

Dewey, J., Democracy and Education, 1916, pp. 256-266. (Discusses 
the nature of science.) 

Miller, I. E., The Psychology of Thinking, 1910, pp. 260-267. (Dis- 
cusses the nature of the hypothesis in the process of induction.) 

Judd, C. H., Psychology of High-School Subjects, 1915, pp. 304-317. 
(Discusses briefly the origin and nature of science from the point 
of view of the psychologist.) 

Pearson, K., The Grammar of Science, 1911, pp. 39-75, 77-112. (Dis- 
cusses the nature of the facts of science and of scientific law. 
Suitable for advanced students.) 

Spencer, H., Essays — Scientific, Political, and Speculative, 1892, Vol. 
II, pp. 1-73, 74-117. (Discusses the genesis of science and the 
classification of the sciences. Suitable for advanced students.) 

PROBLEMS 

1. Which is more reliable in determining the methods that should 
be used in education, science or common sense? Explain. 

2. Why is it that the best books in literature are in many cases the 
oldest, whereas the best books in science are, comparatively speaking, 
the newest? 

3. a. Give some instance in your school work in which you 
experienced a break between the psychological and the logical classi- 



278 The Principles of Education 

fication of subject matter, b. In this instance was the logical organ- 
ization of the subject matter truly logical for you ? Explain. 

4. What in your judgment are the advantages, if any, of giving in 
the high school a course in general science introductory to the work 
in the special science courses ? 

5. In what important ways do you believe that the science courses 
you completed in the high school could have been improved ? 

6. Criticize Herbert Spencer's essay entitled What Knowledge 
is of Most Worth? (Spencer's Education, Ch. I.) 

7. Do you believe in the moral freedom of the will, despite the 
conclusions of natural science with regard to this matter? Give 
the reasons for your answer. 






CHAPTER X 
SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT 

Social development means the increased effectiveness of insti- 
tutions, which are organized in the service of the fundamental 
values of life. It requires greater division of labor and greater 
interdependence of men. Under varying conditions, social 
development may be gradual, arrested, or revolutionary. The 
fine arts, history, and the sciences promote gradual development, 
which is normal. As society advances from the state of nature 
to that of culture, man is guided to greater personal freedom. 

I 

The purpose of this chapter is to find more definitely the nature 
of social development. To simplify the problem, social activities 
may be classified as those of the industries, the home, the school, 
the state, and the church. Each of these institutions serves some 
fundamental human value. 

The history of civilization reveals a long process of 
social development. Each generation not only inherits 
from earlier generations accumulated patterns for pur- 
poses and means of control, but in turn acts vicariously 
by adding to this inheritance and passing on to succeed- 
ing generations still richer values and easier ways for at- 
taining them. Machinery has thus replaced handwork; 
democracy has replaced monarchy; the law of justice 
and mercy has followed the reign of arbitrary might and 
revenge. It is true that this improvement is made by 
individuals, for they are the media through which society 
works ; but what these individuals do, depends upon their 

279 



280 The Principles of Education 

places in a social order. They contribute to a continuous 
social development, the history of which can be traced irre- 
spective of any particular individuals who participated in 
it. One complete step in social advance may be the result 
of a long period of cooperative work ; generations may come 
and go between the origin and the solution of a social 
problem. In the Middle Ages, men toiled in building a 
great cathedral which could not be completed until long 
after they were dead ; they toiled for the benefit of suc- 
ceeding generations, with no hope of seeing the magnifi- 
cent mural decorations of the completed edifice, of hear- 
ing the sublime music of its mighty organ, of feeling the 
inspiration of worship before its altar. So it is in the 
building of civilization. From the very foundation, the 
life-works of countless thousands of human beings lie 
buried in its stone and mortar. What they did depended 
upon what had been done before they came on the scene 
of action, and had a significance far beyond their partic- 
ular lives. To find more definitely the nature of this 
social development to which they contributed is the prob- 
lem of this chapter. 

To simplify the problem, social life may be analyzed 
into institutions. An institution is a complex group of 
activities developed in the service of some fundamental 
purpose the realizing of which is necessary for human 
welfare. Human welfare requires (1) that men be pro- 
vided with food, clothing, and other necessities of life; 

(2) that the race be continued by the rearing of offspring ; 

(3) that these offspring be given purposes and means of 
control necessary to enable them to take their places in 
social life ; (4) that opportunities for doing things neces- 
sary for human welfare be safeguarded ; and (5) that men 
be induced to turn from misleading and capricious selfish 



Social Development 281 

desires and strive continuously for that which is most 
worth while for humanity. In the service of these fun- 
damental purposes, five great institutions have been de- 
veloped, — the industries, the home, the school, the 
state, and the church. These institutions are so closely 
interrelated that they can be separated only as different 
aspects of social life rather than as divisions of it. Their 
effectiveness marks the stage of civilization attained by 
man ; the history of human progress is the history of the 
remaking of these institutions so that they more effec- 
tively realize the purposes in the service of which they 
were established. 

(1) The necessity of the industries to the life of man is 
obvious ; he must eat his daily bread and be sheltered 
in order to live. Elaborate systems of production, ex- 
change, and distribution, which command by far the 
greater part of man's energy, are everywhere evident in 
modern society. 

(2) The home is necessary, because children are born 
helpless and must pass through a long period of infancy 
before they are ready to take up the responsibilities of 
mature life. The permanence of marriage and the con- 
sequent stability of the home are due primarily to the 
long period of infancy during which children need the 
protection and care of parents. 

(3) When social life became complex, the school was 
developed out of the home for the purpose of supplement- 
ing the home in giving individuals, during the period of 
infancy, the preparation necessary for meeting the in- 
creasingly difficult demands of civilization. The func- 
tion of the school is to supplement other educational 
agencies in giving the individual that experience which is 
necessary to make him socially efficient. 



282 The Principles of Education 

(4) The state is primarily for the sake of securing 
justice. Society must protect man in fulfilling the duties 
which human welfare requires of him. The fact that he 
has duties means that he has rights necessary for perform- 
ing these duties. The state should protect the individual 
when forces, either within or without the social group, 
encroach upon 'his rights. Democracy, which gives each 
mature responsible person voice in defining and protecting 
his rights, the division of powers of government, and 
many other safeguards to secure the honest and fair 
making and enforcement of law, are all in the interest of 
the main purpose of the state. 

(5) The function of the church is to promote righteous- 
ness. It develops and keeps alive in men an active appre- 
ciation of the final, all-inclusive purpose which gives the 
deepest significance and value to human life. If this 
purpose is attributed to a personal God, the essential of 
the religious attitude is " Thy will be done." When a 
person feels himself a co-worker with God in realizing the 
purpose of life, the common virtues, upon which he must 
depend for guidance in doing this, receive a deeper sig- 
nificance and stronger sanction than the immediate ends 
which they serve can give to them. Religion thus tends 
to keep man in the straight and narrow way that leads to 
the highest welfare. 

The church, as other institutions, has a basis in human 
nature. Various values which men in common feel, such as 
the value of life itself, of love, of justice, and of truth, point 
onward to worths greater than those which can be realized 
in the temporal world. Is life, which we prize so highly, 
no more than a feverish struggle for existence between 
the cradle and the grave? Is it " a tale told by an idiot, 
full of sound and fury, signifying nothing " ? Is our love 



Social Development 283 

to be mocked by the annihilating power of death ? What 
is the significance of our sense of justice, if all ends with 
this world, where the sun shines and the rain falls equally 
upon the just and the unjust ? And has our desire to know 
ultimate truth no meaning? Shadows of weariness, of 
discouragement, and of dissatisfaction over partial achieve- 
ment which darken our pathway, — are they not to be 
dispelled by a light from afar that gives hope of the final 
realization of that which the temporal life compels us to 
seek, but does not let us find? Values deeply implanted 
in our nature cry out for justification, and their justifi- 
cation points us to God and immortality. Religion is, 
therefore, at its foundation a matter of feeling, a matter of 
faith, because it rests upon the implications of values the 
authority of which is known only by being felt. Although 
some particular form of religion may be accepted as a 
special divine revelation to man, its strongest authority 
is the satisfaction it gives to felt needs of the human soul. 
When religious faith has been established, it returns to 
the practical life to sanction the common things that are 
worth while. By placing in an eternal order the humblest 
acts that contribute to the good of man, such as those of 
our daily work in the home, the factory, and the school, 
it makes these acts divinely significant. Since the com- 
mon virtues are guides in realizing the final purpose of. 
life as it appears in religious faith, and since the thought 
is father to the act, this final purpose commands, " What- 
soever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, 
whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, 
whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of 
good report ; if there be any virtue, if there be any praise, 
think on these things." The value of religion is made 
out of the funded values of human ideals that fail of real- 



284 The Principles of Education 

ization in the temporal life ; religion then gives the whole 
of this funded value as a sanction to strengthen each 
worthy human purpose, and thereby promotes human 
welfare. 

We have now pointed out the principal organized 
means which society has developed for realizing the fun- 
damental human purposes. The industries provide the 
necessities for life; the home nurtures children; the 
school supplements other educational agencies in prepar- 
ing youths for the responsibilities of maturity ; the state 
protects men in their rights so that they may adequately 
perform their duties; the church keeps alive in men's 
experience those values which must be sought in attain- 
ing the highest welfare. 

II 

Since the practices included in an institution are ways of over- 
coming the difficulties in realizing the purpose served by the insti- 
tution, changes which make the realizing of this purpose more 
effective constitute improvement. This improvement requires 
greater division of labor and greater interdependence of men. 
As institutions are all members one of another, they develop with 
relation one to another. 

Institutional practices are the ways of overcoming 
difficulties in realizing the purposes which the institutions 
serve. Since difficulties give rise to problems the solu- 
tions of which are ways of overcoming these difficulties, 
institutional practices, as noted in the discussion of his- 
tory, are the solutions of problems. The institutional 
life of primitive man was simple, because his problems 
were simple. When fire was used to make tools and agri- 
culture turned men from nomadic life to settled abodes, 
problems began to multiply rapidly, and the solutions of 
these problems made the institutional life more complex. 



Social Development 285 

In the industries, men had to solve the problems of how 
to work the fields with advantage, how to make imple- 
ments, how to construct storehouses, dwellings, and the 
necessary furnishings. New relations resulting from life 
in settled communities presented new problems of govern- 
ment. Several illustrations selected at random from 
modern times will make this matter clearer. The educa- 
tional practices of the Jesuits were careful solutions of the 
problems that arose out of the religious situation when 
this order began the counter-reformation. One difficulty 
was to prevent heretical teachings at a time of unstable 
religious beliefs. The answer to this problem included, 
among other things, an elaborately devised ratio stu- 
diorum showing definitely what should be taught, a 
thorough preparation of teachers in the Roman Catholic 
faith, careful plans for the selection of officers and in- 
structors, and a direct inspection of classroom teaching. 
When the emphasis upon drill and the frequent reviews re- 
quired in the Jesuit schools were found to dull the interest 
of the students, one way devised to overcome this diffi- 
culty was a system of rivalry. Again, the growth of the 
modern state systems of education in Europe and Amer- 
ica has not been capricious and haphazard. The devel- 
opment of industrialism and democratic government, for 
the most part, presented new educational problems in 
answer to which changes were made from time to time in 
educational practices. The systems of education in the 
several countries developed along different lines, because 
the social situations and the resulting problems or the 
means available for solving them were not the same. A 
nation, such as Germany, for example, which recognized 
distinct social classes had to devise a corresponding system 
of education differing from that of a nation, such as the 



286 The Principles of Education 

United States, which does not recognize these classes. 
School practices already firmly established by tradition, 
the educational influence of the church, the form of gov- 
ernment, — these and many other considerations modify 
both educational problems and their solutions, and thus 
modify educational practices. In the state as an institur 
tion, to give a further illustration, democratic government 
is a solution of the problem of how to prevent injustice 
on the part of privileged classes ; the direct primary is one 
detail in the solution of the problem of how to secure a 
true expression of the will of the people. 

Since an institution is a means serving some funda- 
mental purpose, changes which make it serve this purpose 
more effectively constitute the development of the insti- 
tution. The general nature of this development and its 
far-reaching social effects may be illustrated by Marmery's 
account of the progressive changes made in the method 
of preparing corn for food, which constitute one phase of 
industrial development. 

Men at an early stage of social life have no other means of pre- 
paring corn for food, beyond boiling it, than by manual labour. Corn 
is spread on a flat or a hollowed stone, and then crushed by hammering 
at it with another stone. Each family prepares corn in this way for 
its own consumption, and the work, whether it be done by the head 
of the family or his wife or children, is slow and roughly done; the 
flour resulting from the crushing is coarse and scarcely fit for kneading 
into dough. A time comes when a savage of genius conceives the 
idea of grinding corn between two heavy flat stones, the upper of 
which is moved backward and forward or in a circular manner by 
one or several hands. This manipulation gives finer flour than before 
and does so in less time too. A double benefit is at once effected; 
the corn-grinder has obviously saved time, and provided better and 
more digestible food. The process spreads quickly among the com- 
munity and a rise of material welfare ensues, for those who feed on the 
improved nourishment are more healthy and stronger, so that they 



Social Development 287 

can accomplish their work more efficiently, and the time spared by 
the new system can be spent in the pursuit of other kinds of work, 
whether it be hunting game for food, or tilling the soil for any purpose, 
or weaving, or implement-making. Time comes when the two grind- 
ing-stones are replaced by a handmill. The inventor of this machine 
is a greater benefactor than the first; the upper stone is now moved 
round and round rapidly by one hand ; the work is far more satisfac- 
tory than by the previous process ; for, as one person is sufficient to 
grind corn for the whole tribe, the other members of the tribe are 
relieved from the necessity of grinding for themselves, and can, undis- 
turbed, attend to various occupations. The benefit is not limited 
to this ; with the new appliance there also arises a new state of things : 
the corn-grinder is paid in kind for his labour, and if the tribe be a 
numerous one, he has to hire assistants in order to carry out the whole 
work; and thence there come to be two orders of men, the master 
and the workmen. The latter have secured a means of existence; 
they can marry and bring up a family with their earnings, be the wages 
what they may — corn, fruit, garden produce, game, or garments. 
Later, say during the Egyptian or the Roman period, the water-mill 
is invented — an improvement by which numerous benefits are 
secured: 1, hand-labour is now replaced by machinery; 2, a natural 
force, water, becomes man's servant, and saves the employment of 
a score of hands ; that is, it has economized or, more properly, mul- 
tiplied labour ; 3, the miller making flour for the whole district now 
becomes a trader ; he buys corn from the grower, thereby benefiting 
the tiller of the soil, who gets a return for his labour sufficient to keep 
himself and his family, and to pay working hands ; 4, the miller also 
sells his flour to the bakers, who obtain it from him at a lower rate 
than if they had to grind their own corn ; 5, the consumer buys ready- 
made bread at a moderate price, since the machinery used has reduced 
the first cost by saving wages to the miller, and certainly far cheaper 
than if he had to leave off his own pursuit, say, weaving, for a whole 
day in order to procure corn, grind it himself, make and bake his 
loaves. The consumer would lose work, wages, and eat dearer and 
worse bread into the bargain. 6, The consumer has a family, and 
the whole family benefits by the invention of the water-mill ; 7, the 
miller, saving hand-labour as he does, nevertheless employs as many or 
more men than before the new invention, no longer as corn-grinding 
hands, but as porters, drivers, buyers, sellers, travellers ; 8, the trade 
thus extended necessitates the making of sacks, hence weavers have 



288 The Principles of Education 

more work and more food; the making of carts, hence wheelwrights, 
if they do not exist already, are brought into existence ; smiths have 
more to do ; harness-makers have more work, and in their turn increase 
the leather trade; this promotes cattle-breeding, and the landowner 
finds a new source of profit in the improved industry. 9, But the 
general distribution of benefits does not stop there; the water-mill 
has to be built, and its construction gives work, hence wages and food, 
to a crowd of people : labourers to excavate the soil for the foundation ; 
wood-cutters to fell trees ; carpenters to prepare and fit the timbers ; 
smiths to make cog-wheels, tires, bolts, nails; mill-stone quarriers 
and mill-stone cutters; tool-makers to provide implements for all 
these; brick-makers, brick-layers, tile-makers, and tilers; an archi- 
tect or clever artisan to plan, direct, and supervise the building. The 
new invention thus does good to the whole community, for the general 
increase of prosperity, on account of the greater purchasing power of 
the people, improves the clothing and building trades — in fact, 
everything. And not material good only has been brought about, 
but moral good also. Work being easily obtainable, men who, 
from want, might have been driven into violence and crime, respect- 
ably bring up a family, use their natural abilities to improve their 
social condition, live orderly lives, and benefit the country. Some 
will even spend their leisure time in mental and mechanical work 
which may be fruitful of ulterior benefits to all. One thing is clear : 
crime has decreased, order and discipline have become a habit, peace 
has become dear — that is, relatively speaking. And when it is 
remembered that the new process of milling finds a ready acceptance 
everywhere, that water-mills are constructed wherever a water stream 
is available for the purpose, it is easy to see how immensely beneficial 
it is to mankind, and what a great benefactor its inventor has 
proved. His invention has made life easier to everyone, has se- 
cured a living to a multitude, has, with the prosperity it has 
caused, permitted a large increase of population. The increase of 
people extends the area and power of peaceful labour (if the word 
civilization be inapplicable), since they will spread beyond the 
former limits of the community, cultivate more land, raise the 
amount of produce, and thus add to the augmentation of the 
general prosperity. After the water-mill comes the windmill, 
which at once doubles the results obtained by the water-mill, 
and in addition causes competition, a new factor which works 
to the consumer's advantage. Later comes the steam flour-mill, 



Social Development 289 

which multiplies these results a hundred times! The modern 
miller stands intellectually and socially far above his predeces- 
sor. He has travelled and has acquired an extensive knowledge of 
the world; he is more than a trader; he is to a certain extent a 
learned man : he is conversant with some questions of political econ- 
omy, and somewhat, may be, with chemistry — a branch of knowledge 
which enables him to know the different properties of every descrip- 
tion of wheat growing in various countries, each weed being affected 
by the climate and soil. Socially, too, he stands very high ; his sons 
are brought up to become merchants, engineers, manufacturers, 
politicians, writers, lawyers, scientific men, each of them an agent of 
progress or a centre of social influence. 

Each industry has a history similar to that of milling ; so that the 
preceding description of growth and results applies to brewing, from 
the poorest beverage to the richest product of the modern brewery; 
weaving, from sackcloth to silk, velvet, lace, tapestry, and so on; 
glass-making, from opaque glass to lenses, spectacles, the telescope, 
the microscope, the spectroscope ; metallurgy, from the rough bronze 
weapon and implement to the steel engine, physical implements, 
cannon, bridges, tunnels, steam trading and war ships, railways; 
paper, from packing-paper to the finest vellum, papier-mache trays, 
tables, and cabinets ; furniture, from the rough stool to the throne ; 
printing, from the label to the book, advertising placards, printed 
calico, engraving ; lighting, from the primitive torch to the oil-lamp, 
gas, and electric light ; and so forth continuously. 1 

This account reveals clearly the fact that the develop- 
ment of an institution requires ever greater division of 
labor and ever greater interdependence of men. In- 
creased efficiency demands that the kind of work done 
by one man be divided among many men who act in close 
cooperation. In this way, time and energy are saved 
through " team work," and each man acquires greater 
skill by confining his attention to a highly specialized 
kind of work, thus learning to do one thing well rather 
than many things less efficiently. 

1 Marmery, J. Villin, Progress of Sdence, London, pp, 289-293. 



290 The Principles of Education 

Changes in one institution tend to bring about changes 
in others. Since education is to prepare for life in all 
institutions, it would be affected, if not too tradition- 
bound, by important changes in any of them. Modifi- 
cations of the school due to the Protestant Reformation 
and to the growth of industries and of democratic govern- 
ment, need only be mentioned in support of this statement. 
The mutual influence of democratic government and in- 
dustries has been very direct. Institutions are all mem- 
bers one of another, and, therefore, must grow with 
relation one to another. 

Ill 

Social development is irregular, (a) It is gradual when men keep 
alive to the intrinsic values of institutional practices, and, at the 
same time, make progress in means of control ; (5) it is arrested 
when they lose sight of the intrinsic ends served by customs ; 
(c) it is revolutionary when, through a conflict in social regula- 
tions, they lose faith in traditions and reconstruct institutional 
practices with the advantage of new knowledge developed after 
the old traditions had become fixed. 

Social development has been irregular. Sometimes it 
has been gradual ; at other times it has been arrested or 
revolutionary. This irregularity is due to three typical 
conditions which influence social development. Let us 
now examine these conditions in detail. 

(1) The essential condition of gradual development 
exists when the purposes which institutional practices 
serve are kept alive in the experience of men. If a 
practice is followed merely as a tradition, without the 
appreciation of its purpose, there is no basis for judging 
whether any particular change would be an improvement 
or not; but, if the purpose is known, any change is at 
once tested, and when found to serve this purpose better 



Social Development 291 

is recognized as an improvement. In the great improve- 
ment of the locomotive, the automobile, and many 
machines used in manufacturing, this condition clearly 
appears. Because men know just what the invention is 
intended to do, they can recognize certain changes as 
improvements. What is true of these forms of industrial 
activities is true of all institutional practices, — political, 
religious, educational, and domestic. The chief differ- 
ence is that the ends served by various machines are rec- 
ognized more easily than those served by complicated 
social practices. 

The development of modern methods of teaching, for 
illustration, has been gradual in so far as educators have 
kept before them the ideal of conforming to the nature 
of the child, an ideal subsidiary to the main purpose 
served by education. Rousseau, expressing a tendency 
of his time, called attention to this ideal with convincing 
force. Basedow, finding that children like motion and 
noise, followed this ideal in modifying methods. Pes- 
talozzi, in the absence of any scientific treatment of the 
mind, depended upon sympathetic insight into the nature 
of the child, which resulted in making his chief contribu- 
tion, so far as methods are concerned, concrete examples. 
He did not explain definitely the essential nature of his 
methods so that teachers by understanding general 
principles could apply them effectively to the work of 
teaching. This is one of the reasons why Yverdon be- 
came the Mecca for open-minded educators; they went 
to learn by observation what they could not get from 
Pestalozzi's statements. 

Men of a younger generation undertook to solve the 
problem of how to describe more definitely a process of 
teaching conforming to the nature of the child's mind. 



292 The Principles of Education 

In the absence of scientific facts, the answer to this 
problem made necessary some guiding theory of the 
nature of mental processes. Three general aspects of 
mind were recognized, — intellect, will, and feeling, — and, 
based on the assumption that one or another of these 
is fundamental, three types of theory of teaching ap- 
peared. Herbart assumed the intellect as fundamental, 
and his problem, therefore, became how to get ideas into 
the mind. He believed that if the process of acquiring 
ideas is properly guided, the pupil will feel and act prop- 
erly. Froebel assumed the will as fundamental, and his 
problem, therefore, became how to guide the activities of 
the child. He believed that if the process of will — self- 
activity — is properly guided, the pupil will have the 
proper feeling and knowledge. Rosmini, an Italian, 
assumed feeling as fundamental, but his theory exerted 
so little influence upon our educational development that 
we are not concerned with it here. 

In answering his problem, Herbart, discarding the old 
faculty psychology and emphasizing the content of the 
mind, regarded ideas as having certain affinities which 
controlled the acquiring and organizing of new ideas. 
The process of acquiring new ideas he analyzed into 
four formal steps, — clearness, association, system, and 
method. Because they show more specifically what 
should be done in teaching, these principles are an improve- 
ment upon the less specific ones attributed to Pestalozzi. 
Followers of Herbart made further improvement in the 
direction of specific principles by describing five instead 
of four formal steps, — preparation, presentation, com- 
parison, generalization, and application. Later the devel- 
opment of psychology, logic, and the theory of knowledge 
revealed the fact that will, or activity, is fundamental. 



Social Development 293 

Guided by this truth, disciples of Herbart gave more 
definite meaning to the first step. As previously defined, 
this step consisted in preparing the mind for new ideas 
by calling to consciousness acquired ideas related to 
them. It was now made to include giving the child a 
purpose, or motive. A purpose is that which a person 
tries to attain ; a motive (cf . movere) is that towards which 
he " moves." Because a purpose which may be served 
by the subject matter is something definite, this change 
gave more explicit direction as to what ideas should be 
called to mind, and was, therefore, a decided improve- 
ment. The change, however, made the five formal steps 
hybrid in nature, because the first step now led the pupil 
to seek a definite purpose, whereas the subsequent steps 
neglected this purpose and remained intellectualistic. 
In order to make the subsequent steps consistent with the 
first one when modified so as to include a motive, Her- 
bart's guiding conception of the primacy of the intellect 
must be abandoned. The steps are then those necessary 
to overcome some difficulty in action by defining and 
solving a problem, and by using the solution in attaining 
the original purpose. This functional method, which has 
reference in every step to a definite act pointed out by the 
motive in the first step, gives much more definite and, 
therefore, better guidance in teaching than does a method 
with intellectualistic steps. This functional method is a 
direct outgrowth of the assumption made by Froebel that 
activity is primary, an assumption now supported by 
psychology, logic, and the theory of knowledge. Step 
by step the functional method has been improved so that 
now the nature of self-activity and the meaning of the 
precept " learn by doing " have been made very definite. 
Each unit of subject matter is regarded as the solution of 



^ 



294 The Principles of Education 

a problem arising out of a difficulty in attaining some 
purpose. Further development of the functional method 
of teaching is needed, because, although it has clearly 
analyzed the process by which the pupil acquires knowl- 
edge, it has not with equal clearness analyzed the process 
by which the pupil acquires appreciation. 1 The gradual 
improvement that has been made in the methods of teach- 
ing would not have been possible, if educational thinkers 
had not kept in mind the purpose of devising principles 
of teaching that correspond to the nature of the child. 

Some general improvements in the school system of 
England may be cited briefly in further illustration of 
the gradual development due to continued appreciation 
of the end served. At the beginning of the nineteenth 
century, common schools in England were conducted by 
religious societies largely under the educational ideal of 
the Reformation. With the growth of industrialism and 
of democratic government came a general appreciation 
of the desirability of an efficient school system. A year 
after an extension of the franchise, the central govern- 
ment, in 1833, began to aid church schools by subsidies. 
This was an improvement upon previous conditions. In 
1870, two years after a further extension of the franchise, 
board schools were established, since the religious socie- 
ties did not provide schools in all localities. The board 
schools were maintained by both government grants and 
local taxes. This change was a great advance. A further 
step toward an efficient system of schools was taken in 
1899, when a central board of education was established 
to have general charge over educational matters. Be- 
cause church schools were not supported so well financially 
as board schools, and were, therefore, less efficient, they 
1 An attempt to analyze this process is made in Ch. XIII. 



Social Development 295 

were permitted in 1902 to share in local taxes. This 
act was another important advance. There was still 
some difficulty because the state did not have sufficient 
control in the management of church schools, but soon a 
movement to remedy this difficulty began. In a similar 
way, other improvements have been made. Thus almost 
decade by decade the English system of common schools 
has been improved, because men have kept clearly in 
mind a definite purpose and have found better and better 
ways for realizing it. 

(2) The condition of arrested development, or formal- 
ism, exists when customs are transmitted to younger 
generations merely as practices which society approves, 
without any indication of the intrinsic ends which these 
customs serve. Without knowledge of the end served, 
one cannot judge whether some particular change is an 
improvement or not. When practices have become for- 
mal, they not only fail to improve, but may even become 
useless, because of changed social conditions which make 
the purposes they originally served no longer vital. A 
most conspicuous example of arrested development is 
found in the history of Chinese institutions for centuries 
preceding the present one. Long before the Christian 
era, China was saved from social disintegration by return- 
ing to old practices in the service of unity, harmony, and 
justice. These practices were described in the Chinese 
sacred books. To insure the permanence of old customs, 
provision was made to put in state offices only men well 
versed in the Chinese Classics. In time, the study of the 
Classics received strong traditional value, but the pur- 
pose which it originally served, — that of promoting unity, 
harmony, and justice in social relations, — was forgotten. 
The slightest change in the Classics was not tolerated, 



296 The Principles of Education 

even though it might improve them as means to the ends 
they originally served. Although centuries of social 
change not only made the language of the Classics anti- 
quated, but also made the content of little value com- 
paratively, an enormous amount of time was wasted in 
the study of these ancient writings. Again, in the educa- 
tion of western Europe, the extensive formal study of 
scholasticism and of Latin and Greek were instances of 
arrested development. Every social practice tends to be- 
come formal, whether in education, politics, religion, or 
any other institution. Arrested development means for- 
malism, because the vital spirit of a practice dies when the 
practice is severed from the intrinsic purpose which alone 
can give it true significance and value. 

(3) The condition of revolutionary development ap- 
pears when a period of arrested development, or formalism, 
is interrupted by a conflict of social practices. China 
began a revolutionary advance with the present century. 
So long as the Chinese wall and the Pacific Ocean isolated 
China from the rest of the world, and so long as new 
practices did not through conflict challenge old ones, 
formal traditions were continued in that country. But 
when the Chinese, through missionary and merchant, 
came into contact with practices of the western world, 
the values of their traditions were successfully challenged 
in the conflict, and a revolutionary change of Chinese 
institutions began. In the history of the western world, 
a number of periods stand out as revolutionary. Promi- 
nent among these are the periods of the sophists and 
philosophers in Greece, the Augustan Age in Rome, the 
Italian Renaissance, the Protestant Reformation, and the 
French Revolution. In each case formal customs and be- 
liefs were interrupted by a conflict of social practices and 



Social Development 297 

a revolutionary change in institutions was begun. The 
present age also is undoubtedly one of important revolu- 
tionary advance, as is evidenced by the rapid changes 
taking place in all institutions. 

When social practices become formal and their values 
are challenged by conflicting traditions, three steps follow 
in order ; namely, (a) the loss of faith in tradition, (b) in- 
dividualism, and (c) the adoption of better practices with 
an appreciation of the ends served by them. 

(a) The loss of faith comes naturally, since the formal 
tradition is accepted not on account of its intrinsic worth, 
but because it is indorsed by society. As soon as society 
is found to indorse also some practice that conflicts with 
it, the individual does not know which to accept. 

(b) In the degree that faith in social regulation is lost, 
individualism, more or less capricious, becomes prominent ; 
that is, individuals follow personal inclinations which may 
conflict with the social welfare. When external convention 
does not guide a person's activities, he falls back upon the 
guidance of feelings more or less primitive and does what 
he likes to do. Since men differ in their likings, there is 
lack of uniformity and cooperation in what they do, 
which makes this individualism conspicuous. This period 
in which men lose faith in the authority of traditions is a 
period of unstable morality. A temptation is the result of 
a conflict between what a person feels under social direc- 
tion he ought to do and what impulsively he feels he 
would like to do. If social authority is removed and he 
is free to do what he pleases, that which would otherwise 
be the evil in a temptation may now be unchallenged when 
it appears to control his conduct. He, therefore, neglects 
his duties in the various social institutions when these 
duties are not in the direction of his personal desires. 



298 The Principles of Education 

(c) This individualistic tendency is short-sighted and 
leads inevitably to dissatisfaction. The fundamental 
values of life can be attained only through methods which 
are worked out slowly and painfully through years of 
social cooperation, and which are made more effective by 
every advance in civilization. The technique for attaining 
the most important values of life is just what constitutes 
civilization. Capricious desires of an individual that 
conflict with it must be disciplined, not clothed with 
authority. When they get control of conduct, the organ- 
ization of activities for the attainment of human welfare 
has given place to anarchy. 

Sooner or later the loss of the greater values that make 
life worth while and the consequent dissatisfaction cause 
men to turn from individualism and to seek better prac- 
tices with an appreciation of the ends served by these 
practices. Inquiry as to what makes life worth while and 
how it can be attained becomes prominent. Men may 
thus find anew the intrinsic values of old customs and 
" go back to the good old times," as the Chinese did when 
they submitted to the teachings of the Classics; they 
may accept the customs of another civilization, as the 
Romans did when they adopted the Christian religion to 
take the place of pagan beliefs in which they had lost 
faith, or as the Italians did when, in the Renaissance, 
Graeco-Roman ideas were introduced; they may strike 
out anew and develop by their own effort social regula- 
tions, as the Athenians did in the philosophical period, 
and as people of the western world are now doing in 
a social reconstruction that dates back to the climax of 
individualism emphasized in the French Revolution. 
When the period of reconstruction comes, men have 
the advantage of vital appreciations of worth and of 



Social Development 299 

knowledge acquired after the old traditions were fixed, 
whether the new development is made under the guidance 
of borrowed patterns or whether new patterns are de- 
vised. As a result, the new practices are better than the 
old. The adoption of these new practices means social 
progress. 

The analysis of revolutionary advance given above 
agrees with Spencer's statement of the " three phases 
through which human opinion passes." 1 He says that 
these phases are " the unanimity of the ignorant, the 
disagreement of the inquiring, and the unanimity of the 
wise," and adds, " They are not sequences in time only ; 
they are sequences in causation." His attention here is 
confined to revolutionary changes only, because they have 
been conspicuous in the development of civilization ; and 
what he says about opinion is true of practices, because the 
former guides the latter. The period of the unanimity of 
the ignorant is the period of formalism, when, ignorant of 
the true significance of social practices, men carry them 
out under the authority of mere custom. The period 
marked by the disagreement of the inquiring covers the 
stage of individualism and the beginning of reconstruc- 
tion. The unanimity of the wise means the general ac- 
ceptance of practices with a knowledge and appreciation 
of their true significance. In time, the unanimity of the 
wise passes over into the unanimity of the ignorant, be- 
cause knowledge and appreciation of the significance of 
the practices are gradually lost, although the practices 
themselves continue under the weight of traditional au- 
thority. 

Let us now consider a concrete instance of revolu- 
tionary development. In early times Athens had a form 
1 Spencer, Herbert, Education, 1890, Ch. II, p. 87. 



300 The Principles of Education 

of education which had grown up in answer to the demands 
of the city-state. Industrial work having been turned over 
to slaves, the chief social demands upon citizens were to 
meet the problems of democracy within the state and the 
dangers of war without it. In educating the citizen- 
soldier, there were three stages. In the first stage, boys 
from the ages of seven to sixteen spent half of the day in 
the palestra, where their bodies were developed by physi- 
cal exercises, and the other half of the day in the music 
school, where, learning to " love the things that ought to 
be loved and to hate the things that ought to be hated," 
they acquired patriotic and religious ideals. After their 
hearts had become set on the right things, the youths were 
given, in addition to physical exercises, an apprenticeship 
training in the activities of the citizen-soldier. During 
the period of civic training, which lasted two years, the 
boys spent half time in physical exercises in the gym- 
nasium and half time enjoying the freedom of the city, 
where in a very direct way they became acquainted with 
the civic activities of the city-state. In the period of mili- 
tary training, they spent one year in police duty near the 
city and the other in active military life on the frontier. 
At the age of twenty, after the youths had, in these three 
stages of training, acquired the right purposes and the 
means of realizing them, they were admitted to full 
citizenship. 

At first these educational practices had strong authority, 
for they were recognized as necessary to secure peace and 
justice within the state and protection against enemies 
without it. In time, however, tradition laid its chilly 
hand upon them, as the purposes which originally gave 
them authority became less keenly appreciated. In 
other words, they became formal. 



Social Development 301 

Mere tradition is strong enough to continue social prac- 
tices indefinitely, if there is nothing to oppose it, as has 
been seen in the case of China. But the Athenians 
were not isolated from the outside world, and, owing to 
this, opposing traditions eventually made their appear- 
ance. The Constitution of Clisthenes admitted to cit- 
izenship in the Athenian state all free people of Attica, 
with purposes and practices differing from those of earlier 
Athenians. Then came contact with the traditions of 
the Orient as a result of the Persian wars. Commercial 
enterprises took Athenians to foreign countries and 
foreigners to Athens. The enrichment of Athens with 
money misappropriated from the treasury of the Delian 
League also attracted many foreigners to the city. Travel 
and colonization brought still more foreign customs, (a) 
As a consequence, traditions tended to lose authority 
through conflict, and, in so far as this happened, the 
individual was deprived of social guidance in which he 
had confidence. For example, because of the conflicts 
respectively among the religious, educational, and po- 
litical traditions of the various people with whom he 
associated, he lost faith to a large extent in the religious, 
educational, and political ideals of his ancestors. 

(b) In the absence of other guidance, the individual was 
left at the mercy of more or less selfish purposes, from 
which he had not been alienated in this conflict. Selfish 
interests differed so that some individuals sought one thing 
and some another. The desire for wealth, selfish political 
and social ambitions, and the love of pleasure usurped 
the place of loyalty to state and religion. Since the life 
of the soldier was filled with hardship, the youths began 
to escape it. Since lounging in the gymnasium and con- 
versing with one another were more pleasing than run- 



302 The Principles of Education 

ning, jumping, wrestling, and boxing in the arena, Aris- 
tophanes had reason to complain that the youths were 
becoming " narrow chested and long tongued." Interest 
in the serious activities of citizenship waned. Ear- 
pleasing music and love songs encroached upon the mar- 
tial and religious airs that had predominated in the music 
school. This condition meant individualism. 

A new class of teachers, called sophists, appeared in 
response to this new demand for individual satisfaction. 
They came first from the colonies, where the conflict of 
traditions and a consequent demand for individualistic 
teachers had taken place at an earlier date. Some of these 
teachers went so far as to boast that they could teach any- 
body anything. They taught many subjects, from as- 
tronomy to cooking. They gave chief emphasis, how- 
ever, to rhetoric, because power to persuade is effective in 
carrying out one's personal ambitions by securing the as- 
sistance of other men. Some sophists claimed even that 
they were able to teach how to make the worse appear the 
better reason, and thus to enable their students to dupe 
other people. The extreme individualists said that the 
individual man was the measure of all things, meaning 
that his individual feelings should take the place of social 
regulation. Justice was regarded as the interest of the 
stronger; or, in other words, with no over-individual 
regulation, might was regarded as right, when selfish 
desires conflicted. Consistent with their individualism, 
sophists demanded money for teaching, because loyalty 
to the interests of the state was not felt as a motive strong 
enough to command their efforts as teachers. This was 
indeed a period of individualism ; social ideals had given 
way, in a conspicuous measure, to selfish ambitions. 

(c) The stage was now set for the work of reconstruc- 



Social Development 303 

tion. Social regulations are not normally mere impo- 
sitions upon the individual ; they are guides which society, 
in its generations of experience, has worked out as leading 
to the highest human welfare. When social regulations 
lost authority, values less effective in securing human 
welfare usurped command. The short-sightedness of 
these selfish purposes led to disappointment. Is not 
every temptation a struggle between values supported by 
social authority and what the individual feels that he 
would personally like to do? If social authority, in the 
case of temptation, is too weak to command, does he not 
follow his lower inclinations? And are not these incli- 
nations classified as lower just because they do not serve 
the greater values of life ? Failure to realize these greater 
values is bound to bring dissatisfaction and consequent 
attempts to find better forms of conduct. 

In Athens, far-sighted men saw that the state, which 
should bring justice, peace, and security, was going to 
pieces. When old ideals which had led men to cooperate 
for the good of all lost their power, when members of the 
state neglected civic and military training, when they 
sought private advantage rather than public good, how 
could it be otherwise? Short-sighted men whose vision 
went no farther than selfish interests suffered disappoint- 
ment ; for there is a law as old as human nature that man 
finds his highest salvation by losing himself in the serv- 
ice of others. This law is true because man is by nature a 
social individual, and the greatest satisfaction comes from 
acting in accordance with his nature. So among the 
Athenians there appeared two purposes, one to secure the 
unity of the state and the other to gain the greatest pos- 
sible satisfaction in life. In the service of these purposes, 
social practices must now be put into the melting pot, 



304 The Principles of Education 

the dross must be eliminated, and out of the pure gold in 
them new practices must be made. 

Social and individual welfare are not two different 
things that normally come into conflict. The highest 
realization of the one means also the highest realization 
of the other, for the values which the individual desires 
are normally social as well as individual. Those who had 
been strongly influenced by the individualistic movement 
did not, however, appreciate the value of securing the gen- 
eral welfare. When Aristophanes urged them to go back 
to the good old times, they did not respond. When Con- 
fucius attempted to overcome social disintegration in 
China by a similar recommendation, his efforts led even- 
tually to success, because China was a monarchy and those 
who were interested in preserving the integrity of the 
state had power to give the authority of leadership only to 
men who were thoroughly conversant with the traditions 
of the good old times. But Athens was a democracy. 
The Athenian people had to be interested in a reform 
before it could be made effectual. So far as the influence 
of individualism prevailed, they were prone to listen only 
to words that promised satisfaction to individual desires. 
Aristophanes, Xenophon, and others who appealed to the 
motive of securing the welfare of the state found only a 
weak response, whereas Socrates, who emphasized the prob- 
lem of how to secure the greatest personal good, quickly 
gained an audience. He was compelled, however, to con- 
fess his inability to solve this problem. Then this question 
became the heritage of Plato, Aristotle, and less prominent 
professional philosophers. The problem of Plato's Re- 
public, for instance, is, How should a man act in order to 
get the most out of life? These philosophers, in answer 
to the question society had thus given them, offered 



Social Development 305 

solutions which were later taken up by tradition as guides 
for social action. In the field of education, the philo- 
sophical schools and other institutions which emphasized 
the theoretical rather than the practical, were the imme- 
diate results. Here the movement hardened into formal- 
ism, before the step in social advance was completed. 
The Romans, however, carried on the movement by put- 
ting Greek theory into practice. In the fields of govern- 
ment and religion, Greek philosophy furnished ideas to 
which the practical Romans gave expression in juris- 
prudence, Christian theology, the organization of the 
Roman Catholic Church, and the political organization of 
the Roman Empire itself. With ideas of social practice, 
Greece made captive her conquerors, and, as a result, the 
social reconstruction in the simple city-state became a 
controlling influence throughout the whole civilized 
world. 

IV 

The fine arts, history, and the sciences promote gradual advance, 
which is the normal form of social development. 

In the never-ending road from the state of nature to that 
of culture, gradual advance is better than arrested devel- 
opment or revolutionary advance. It may be regarded 
as the normal condition. In arrested development, 
many institutional practices, because of changed situa- 
tions, fail to serve the purposes for which they were 
devised; in revolutionary development, useful practices 
are often cast aside with the useless; but in gradual 
advance, institutions are ever undergoing a process of 
reconstruction which keeps them in the service of their 
true ends, so far as the stage of knowledge men have 
attained makes this possible, 



306 The Principles of Education 

The fine arts, history, and the sciences, which ever 
become more necessary as society grows in complexity, 
are in the service of gradual development. In a confus- 
ing multiplicity of purposes, the fine arts keep men alive 
to fundamental values ; in the intricate relations between 
means and ends, history reveals the purposes served by 
institutional practices ; in the complexity of means used, 
a highly developed scientific technique is necessary for 
efficient control. When there is an adequate appreciation 
of definite values to be attained and a continuous improve- 
ment in scientific control, we have the essential conditions 
for gradual development. 

V 

The development of civilization ever increases the personal freedom 
of man by revealing to him the intrinsic worth of what he does 
as the authority for his conduct, and by enabling him to make 
nature a servant in carrying out his purposes. 

In the progress of civilization from nature to culture, 
society makes the individual more and more a free person. 
It does this by guiding him to stronger and more definite 
appreciation of the fundamental values of human life 
served by social institutions, so that he cooperates with 
his fellow men in seeking these values from inner choice 
rather than from external compulsion. The man who 
cooperates with his fellows from mere individual economic 
necessity or fear of law, and not because he feels the true 
worth of what he does as a social activity, is as truly a 
slave as his horse, which, drawing a plow or a wagon 
under the compulsion of the bit and the lash, blindly per- 
forms a service to society. With the advance of civil- 
ization, society not only frees man by revealing the intrin- 
sic values of his activities, but also by guiding him to 



Social Development 307 

greater control over nature in realizing these values. To 
the extent that he learns how to avoid disease and hunger, 
and, indeed, how to satisfy every morally legitimate 
want, he is transformed from the slave of nature to the 
master of nature. Thus does the development of civili- 
zation through the improvement of institutions mark the 
progress of man from the low plane of animal existence 
to an ever greater realization of the boundless poten- 
tialities of human life. 

VI 

Natural science regards social development as improvement in the 
system of group adjustment to environment, and institutions as 
group habits. In explaining, in accordance with the laws of habit 
formation, conditions influencing the development of group habits, 
natural science supports the conclusions reached from the teleo- 
logical point of view with regard to gradual social advance, arrested 
development, and revolutionary advance. In explaining the nature 
of the guidance by the group, it gives the counterpart of civiliza- 
tion guiding man to personal freedom. 

Our next problem is to find whether the foregoing 
explanation of social development is supported by natural 
science. 

In the lower forms of life, each organism is compara- 
tively independent in the process of adjustment to envi- 
ronment. Living as a hermit in its solitary web, the 
spider gets along very well. In the process of evolution, 
a great advance was made, however, when the individual 
organism secured adjustment not alone, but by cooper- 
ating with others. Through this change, the group be- 
came the unit for adjustment, and the individual organism 
was no longer self-sufficient. Cooperation brought better 
adjustment, because, by requiring of any one member of 
the group only a small part of the reactions, it enabled 



308 The Principles of Education 

the group as a unit to develop a complex system of re- 
sponses far beyond the capability of any one organism to 
acquire. The growth in complexity of group reactions 
is unlimited, because the greater complexity of reactions 
by the group is balanced by the greater division of them 
among members of the group. This development has 
been rapid in the case of human beings, since, having 
incomplete nervous systems at birth, they rapidly acquire 
and transmit new forms of adjustment. Natural science 
explains in this way the general character of human 
development with its increasing division of responses 
among individuals and the increasing interdependence of 
these individuals. 

Activities taken over by the group as a unit (1) furnish 
for individual organisms within the group such neces- 
sities as food and shelter ; (2) take care of offspring during 
the period of infancy ; (3) bring about in infant organisms 
the acquired reactions that enable them to participate 
effectively in group activities ; (4) protect each organism 
from those acts of others which would interfere with the 
adjustment process ; (5) give the greatest unity and har- 
mony in adjustments by making individual organisms, in 
their divided fields of reactions, respond to the widest 
environment and promote the adjustment of the group as 
a whole. The organization of activities that tends to 
bring about each of these results is an institution. These 
institutions, it is obvious, are respectively the industries 
including commerce, the home, the school, the state, and 
the church. 

The natural science explanation of the varying condi- 
tions which affect the growth of institutions and, there- 
fore, social development, is made in accordance with the 
laws of habit formation. Institutions may be regarded 



Social Development 309 

as social habits subject to the laws of habit formation, 
because the activities which constitute them are habits 
of cooperating individual organisms. Only through. the 
modification of these habits of individual organisms do 
institutions change. (1) The condition for gradual de- 
velopment is that in which secondary reactions are not 
isolated, but remain connected with the fundamental 
habits the functioning of which they facilitate. The 
failure of a fundamental habit to function compels changes 
in the secondary responses connected with it, and when 
any influence upon the nervous system makes in these 
secondary responses modifications that result in better 
functioning of the fundamental habit, these modifications 
are incorporated with the system of habits. When, how- 
ever, secondary responses become isolated from the fun- 
damental habits in connection with which they were de- 
veloped, they may, as explained below, be continued 
without change. Since means of control correspond to 
secondary responses, which function in overcoming checks 
in fundamental habits, and since purposes in the last 
analysis correspond to fundamental habits, this material- 
istic explanation supports our conclusion that the condi- 
tion of gradual advance exists when men recognize the 
purposes of the institutional practices in which they are 
engaged. (2) The condition of arrested development is 
that in which a group of responses becomes isolated from 
the general system of habits to which it normally belongs, 
and, consequently, is set off by only a part of the stimuli 
which normally cause this system of habits to function. 
James says, " Who is there that has never wound up his 
watch on taking off his Waistcoat in the day time, or 
taken his latch key out on arriving at the doorstep of a 
friend? " Winding the watch and taking out the latch 



310 The Principles of Education 

key are, under such circumstances, isolated from the 
general systems of habits to which they respectively 
belong, so that they are set off by only a part of the 
stimuli that normally cause these systems of habits to 
function. In the one case, winding the watch is isolated 
from the whole system of habits connected with retiring 
at night; in the other case, taking out the latch key is 
isolated from the whole system of habits connected with 
approaching through a certain street and dooryard one's 
own house and entering it. Furthermore, only part of 
the stimuli normally belonging to the situation retiring- 
at-night in the one case and of the situation entering- 
one's-house in the other, are responsible respectively for 
the winding up of the watch and the taking out of the 
latch key. Let us now consider a similar instance with 
an extensive group of social habits. The acquiring Of the 
Latin language became the chief part of the school cur- 
riculum at a time when this language was the only medium 
for transmitting a vast range of useful adjustments orig- 
inated by earlier peoples. It was thus made a part of the 
great system of educational habits developed in the process 
of transmitting acquired reactions. Although in time the 
vernacular languages became better media than Latin 
for the general transmission of acquired reactions, the 
study of Latin continued to be the main part of the cur- 
riculum, because, in the process of transmission to later 
generations, it had become isolated from the system of 
habits in the improving of which it had been incorpo- 
rated into the school activities. Evidence of this isolation 
is the fact that the study of Latin was now called forth 
by only a part of the stimuli belonging to the system of ( 
educational habits, with the result that changes in those 
wider environmental conditions which had been effective 



Social Development 311 

in putting Latin into the school curriculum lost their 
control over it after it had been put there. The study of 
Latin was now a response merely to the narrow school 
situation, and, therefore, was limited to the language 
itself. Since in the last analysis purposes correspond 
to fundamental habits, the isolation of secondary re- 
sponses, as the study of Latin, from the fundamental 
habits to which they normally belong is, when stated 
teleologically, the separation of activities from the pur- 
poses they normally serve. Thus does natural science 
support the conclusion reached teleologically that the 
condition of arrested development is that in which social 
practices are transmitted without the transmission of the 
purposes they normally serve. (3) When the group 
develops extensive new systems of responses because old 
systems of group habits have by mutual conflict been 
checked in their functioning, we have the materialistic 
counterpart of revolutionary development caused by a 
conflict of traditions. This condition follows a period of 
formalism, in which responses are more easily overcome 
because they have been weakened by isolation from fun- 
damental habits to which they normally belong. 

The condition of gradual advance keeps up continu- 
ously the best possible adjustments of the organism. 
Under this condition, each change in the environment or 
improvement in the nervous connections of the organism 
results in the acquiring of more adequate responses. The 
fine arts and history promote gradual development by 
preventing the isolation of reactions from the fundamental 
habits to which they belong, and the sciences promote it 
by organizing more effectually the secondary reactions, 
which correspond to means of control. 1 

1 See pp. 238-240 and 273-276. 



312 The Principles of Education 

The improvement of group guidance is the counter- 
part of the advancement of civilization from nature to 
culture. That this advancement of civilization increases 
the freedom of men finds its counterpart in the conclu- 
sions of natural science. By developing in the organism 
upon the basis of instincts elaborate systems of response, 
group guidance makes the organism more self-determined 
in its reactions. Its cooperation with the group in ad- 
justment is determined by far-reaching systems of re- 
sponse developed in the organism and does not have to be 
directed at every turn by group interference. Further- 
more, as group guidance develops more efficient reactions 
in an organism, the powers of the latter are extended, 
because its acts modify the environment in a way that 
turns external forces to work in its service, as in the use of 
waterfalls and steam power. Instead of merely remaining 
subject to the forces in the environment, the organism 
makes the environment assist in the adjustment. Thus 
does natural science give the counterpart of the fact that 
social development guides the individual to greater free- 
dom by making him more self-determined in action and 
also by making him the master rather than the slave 
of nature. 

REFERENCES 

Horne, H. H., The Philosophy of Education, 1905, pp. 1-4. (Discusses 
briefly institutions as agencies of civilization.) 

Baldwin, J. M., Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental Develop- 
ment, 1906, pp. 537-550. (Explains the nature of social progress.) 

Ellwood, C. A., Sociology in its Psychological Aspects, 1912, pp. 366- 
381. (Gives the theory of social progress.) 

MacVannel, J. A., Outline of a Course in the Philosophy of Education, 
1912, pp. 117-120, 162-168, (Gives a condensed statement of 



Social Development 313 

the nature of institutions and of the relation of education to 
social progress. Valuable especially for advanced students.) 
Pearson, K., The Grammar of Science, Pt. I, 1911, pp. 1-3. (Gives 
some brief, interesting remarks regarding social progress and our 
understanding of it.) 

PROBLEMS 

1. Show why the responsibility of the school is greater now than 
it was fifty years ago. 

2. Why is the study of education more important now in the 
United States than it was one hundred years ago? 

3. Show how the school promotes social progress. 

4. State five important problems peculiar to the United States 
at the present time. 

5. Does society tend to become more unified as it develops ? Ex- 
plain. 

6. What is the meaning of democracy? 

7. What advantages has a democracy over a beneficent autocracy? 

8. How can the United States be made more democratic? 

9. Has division of labor tended to make men more or less demo- 
cratic ? 

10. What are the main influences that have led to greater centraliza- 
tion of authority in the United States ? 

11. Explain in detail, from the point of view of education, the 
essential steps in the advances known as the Italian Renaissance, the 
Protestant Reformation, and the Naturalistic Movement. 

12. Are we living in a period of arrested development, gradual de- 
velopment, or revolutionary advance ? Explain. 

13. Show that as a result of education you now have greater freedom 
than you had five years ago. 



THE EDUCATIONAL PROCESS 



CHAPTER XI 

ANALYSIS OF THE EDUCATIONAL PROCESS 

The educational process, which is found in all institutions, 
unites the individual and the social processes by selecting social 
patterns and by adapting them to the nature of the individual so 
that he acquires purposes and means of control necessary for 
social efficiency. The function of the school is to supplement the 
educative work of the other institutions. . Various traditional 
statements of the aim of education, made with regard to the 
school, are reconciled in the wider aim of social efficiency, which 
is emphasized in recent times by the growing complexity of 
social life and by the scientific study of education. The educa- 
tive work of all institutions should be rationalized with reference 
to this aim, which provides for gradual social growth and for free 
personal development. In rationalizing the work of the school, 
the most important problems, which must ever be solved anew 
because of changing social conditions, are those of selecting and 
organizing the curriculum and of finding the methods of teaching. 
These two problems are closely related, the one emphasizing the 
content of subject matter and the other emphasizing the form in 
which subject matter is presented. 



The educational process unites the social and the individual pro- 
cesses by selecting social patterns and by adapting them to the 
nature of the individual so that he acquires the purposes and the 
means of control necessary to make him socially efficient. 

At birth, the child has only the crude basis for the pur- 
poses and the means of control which are necessary to 
guide his action effectively. He is incomplete; not yet 
himself. In order to realize the possibilities of his nature, 

317 



318 The Principles of Education 

he must be able to work for a living, but he knows no 
trade ; he must share the responsibility of continuing the 
race, but he knows nothing of the duties of parenthood ; 
he must help to promote justice and peace among men, 
but he knows nothing of human rights and duties ; he must 
feel the inspiring thrill of a world purpose which sanc- 
tions the highest forms of human development, but he is 
ignorant of religion. Verily, he must be born again. 
Just as he passed through a process of development be- 
fore he was born into the physical world, so he must pass 
through a superior process of development before he is 
born into the spiritual world. This superior process of 
development, in which the individual is equipped with 
the appreciations of value and the knowledge of control 
necessary for full participation in social life, is education. 
Our problem now is to find the general nature of this 
process. 

Education, we have learned, unites the individual and 
the social processes, which have been described in pre- 
vious chapters. On the basis of natural endowment, the 
individual builds new purposes and new means of control 
in accordance with definite laws. Society furnishes 
"patterns" that guide the individual to acquire, in ac- 
cordance with these laws, valuable purposes and effective 
means of control, which have been the result of ages of 
social progress and which he could not attain without 
such guidance. In uniting these two factors of experi- 
ence, the educational process (1) selects social patterns 
and (2) guides individual development in accordance 
with them. 

It must select patterns with regard to their social 
values and also with regard to their adaptability to imma- 
ture individuals in various stages of development. On 



The Educational Process 319 

the social side, selection must be made because patterns 
exist for evil as well as for good conduct. The profes- 
sional thief, just as truly as the honest business man, is 
guided in his conduct by purposes and means of control 
acquired under social direction. Furthermore, division 
of labor in pursuits which promote human welfare re- 
quires that various individuals be prepared for different 
kinds of activities, each with its peculiar purposes and 
means of control. Even in the case of primitive peoples, 
where social patterns are comparatively meager, labor is 
divided. Men fight the enemies and hunt game, whereas 
women take care of the children and do the menial work 
in the camp. As society advances, soldiers, priests, and 
artisans perform different functions in the social group. 
Even within these classes there are subdivisions for each 
of which a special sort of preparation is required. In 
modern social life, the complex division of labor neces- 
sitating different kinds of training is everywhere mani- 
fest. Some ideals and methods are, moreover, preferable 
to others for the same general kind of activity, whether 
it be in the home, factory, state, or other institution. On 
the individual side, selection must be made with reference 
to the development already attained by those who are to 
be educated ; because, as we have found, an individual can 
acquire new purposes and means of control only on the 
basis of those already realized in his experience. Social 
patterns that do not fit his experience cannot function in 
his development. 

After social patterns have been selected, the individual 
must be put under conditions that lead him to profit by 
their guidance. Purposes, or motives, to use these pat- 
terns must be aroused in his experience ; and, where the 
patterns do not fit well into the purposes and means of 



320 The Principles ©f Education 

control he has acquired, appreciations must be developed 
and explanations must be made that prepare a basis of 
experience necessary to make guidance in accordance 
with the patterns effective. This work is done usually 
by persons who have already attained the development 
represented by the social patterns and who have also a 
sympathetic insight into the immature experience of the 
individual to be educated. With the starting point and 
a near definite goal in mind, they can devise the inter- 
mediate steps necessary. 

II 

All institutions educate. 

Every institution educates; it selects social patterns 
and guides the development of individuals in accordance 
with them. In a shoe factory, the best ways, of making 
shoes are selected and arranged according to the increasing 
abilities of employees as they advance to more respon- 
sible positions. Individuals are put under conditions 
which make vital to them the acquiring of means of con- 
trol necessary for manufacturing shoes, and are helped 
over difficulties through explanations and demonstra- 
tions by co-workers and foremen. They acquire not only 
means of control, but also purposes which regulate the 
special kinds of work involved. The minute division of 
labor and the use of machinery, it is true, have put serious 
limitations upon the educative influence of many factories, 
but they have not destroyed this influence. As in the 
case of the shoe factory, all forms of industry educate. 
In the home, furthermore, members of the family acquire 
purposes and means of control selected and made vital 
to them by this institution. Children are led to appre- 



The Educational Process 321 

ciate common moral ideals and to understand various 
kinds of domestic activities. They learn the most useful 
forms of speech. The home provides, in many cases, the 
only training individuals receive for the responsibilities 
of parenthood. By participating in activities of citizen- 
ship, men acquire purposes and ideas in the field of govern- 
ment. In the church, they are given religious ideals and 
trained to carry on the work of this institution. The 
school develops both the pupils and the teachers. 

Ill 

The function of the school is to supplement the educative work 
of the other institutions where they fail to prepare individuals for 
effective participation in social life. 

The school differs from other institutions in guiding 
individual development, because education is the essential 
function of the school, whereas it is only incidental to the 
work of other institutions. Factories are to produce cer- 
tain kinds of commodities ; the home is to nurture chil- 
dren ; the state is to secure justice ; the church is to pro- 
mote righteousness; but the school is to educate. For 
this reason, the school, under normal conditions, educates 
better than other institutions. Patterns that constitute 
the school course of study are selected to develop indi- 
viduals for many important kinds of activity, not for one 
particular kind as in the case of a shoe factory, in which 
the educational influences are limited, in a large measure, 
to the making of shoes. Pupils are advanced in the 
school as rapidly as their development justifies, not held 
back because higher positions are occupied by others. 
The school constantly influences individuals to make 
progress, whereas other institutions often leave them un- 
disturbed to continue the same kind of work indefinitely. 



322 The Principles of Education 

Instruction in the school is systematic, according to a 
more or less definite scientific technique ; in other institu- 
tions, it consists of haphazard explanations and demon- 
strations by persons who, unaided by a scientific knowl- 
edge of how purposes and means of control are acquired, 
depend for guidance in teaching upon only sympathetic 
insight into the experience of the individual needing 
assistance. 

The school exists just because the other institutions fail 
to give the education required for effective participation 
in them. In primitive times, individuals were educated 
only incidentally through imitation and active partici- 
pation in social life. The school was unnecessary. When 
advancing civilization greatly increased the demands upon 
the individual, this incidental education became inade- 
quate. The school was then developed as a social institu- 
tion to meet the increasing need for an education supple- 
mentary to that given by other institutions. Its function 
is to do what they leave undone in preparing the indi- 
vidual for his place in the social order ; or, in other words, 
to balance the equation between social demands upon the 
individual and the ability which the individual has ac- 
quired incidentally through other institutions to meet 
these demands. 

. A few examples of the supplementary character of school 
education will reveal more clearly the relation between 
the school and other institutions. The lowest grade of 
school work is planned for children who can talk and who 
have other abilities acquired in the home. At one time, 
the industries educated individuals for special trades by 
means of the apprenticeship system; but when this ap- 
prenticeship system was abandoned, the responsibility 
of industrial training fell, in a large measure, upon the 



The Educational Process 323 

school. When the amount of knowledge required for 
efficient conduct of the home greatly increased through 
the application of science to household arts, and, at the 
same time, the educative influence of the home in such 
matters decreased, the school was called upon to teach 
household arts. When advanced scientific methods were 
applied to agriculture, and, as a consequence, life on the 
farm no longer afforded adequate educational oppor- 
tunities, the • study of agriculture was introduced into 
schools. 

Several institutions have called upon the school for 
assistance in moral training. The impersonal relations 
in modern life have removed some strong sanctions of 
good conduct. Formerly one man worked for another 
with whom he was personally acquainted and for whom 
he had usually a friendly feeling. This personal rela- 
tionship gave a strong sanction to honesty ; for, when he 
looked his employer in the eyes, he realized vividly that 
his dishonest gain would be an unjust injury to his em- 
ployer. But when a man worked for a corporation formed 
by many stockholders whom he did not see, and when he 
recognized the fact that the stockholders would not feel 
the slight injury due to a small dishonest gain on his part, 
this personal sanction was greatly weakened. Close 
supervision, time clocks, cash registers, specially devised 
systems of accounting, and other methods have been 
adopted to remedy this difficulty; but, even under these 
improved conditions, many persons do not have the 
equipment of ideals necessary to make them do right. 
As relations in government became more impersonal, 
because the authority was more centralized and because 
the population had increased, moral sanctions due to 
personal relationship were weakened. Changed condi- 



324 The Principles of Education 

tions of life due to the growth of large cities lessened the 
moral influence of the home, and changed religious be- 
liefs weakened temporarily the religious sanctions in the 
experience of many people. Such institutional changes, 
together with the development of higher standards of 
right living, have given emphasis to the need of moral 
training in the schools. ^S 

IV 

In the wider aim of education as social efficiency, we find the re- 
conciliation of various traditional one-sided statements of the aim 
of education. Some of these are that education should lead to 
ideals, knowledge, discipline, culture, individual development, 
harmonious development of all the powers of the individual, good 
citizenship, and ability to secure the material necessities of life. 

When educators recognize an important demand which 
changes in institutional life at some particular time make 
upon the school, the satisfaction of this demand becomes 
for the time being an aim for educational endeavor. 
Although this aim marks the change needed for social 
efficiency in a particular situation, it may assume the 
importance of the sole aim of education. In this way, 
various traditional statements of the aim- of education 
have arisen. As Professor Dewey says : 

For the statement of aim is a matter of emphasis at a given, time. 
And we do not emphasize things which do not require emphasis; — 
that is, such things as are taking care of themselves fairly well. We 
tend rather to frame our statement on the basis of the defects and 
needs of the contemporary situation; we take for granted, without 
explicit statement which would be of no use, whatever is right or 
approximately so. We frame our explicit aims in terms of some 
alteration to be brought about. It is, then, no paradox requiring 
explanation that a given epoch or generation tends to emphasize in 
its conscious projections just the things which it has least of in actual 



The Educational Process 325 

fact. A time of domination by authority will call out as response 
the desirability of great individual freedom; one of disorganized 
individual activities the need of social control as an educational 



Some of the various traditional statements of the aim 
of education are that it should lead to ideals, knowledge, 
discipline, culture, individual development, harmonious 
development of all the powers of the individual, good 
citizenship, and ability to secure the material necessities 
of life. Because each such aim calls attention to some 
needed change in a particular social situation and not to 
the complete function of education, it becomes inade- 
quate and misleading when new social situations arise 
calling for new modifications in the work of the school. 
As partial aims of education, they are included in the 
wider aim, giving to it a richer meaning and finding in it 
their own reconciliation. A review of several of these 
aims will reveal these truths more clearly. 

In early Athens, the chief aim of education in the 
school was to develop patriotic and religious ideals, to 
make the young " love the things that ought to be loved 
and hate the things that ought to be hated." The main 
social obligations of free men were domestic, religious, 
civic, and military. Industrial work was turned over 
largely to slaves. Youths learned how to meet these 
obligations by participation in social life other than that 
of the school. Civic practices, for example, were learned 
by visiting law courts and public meetings; military 
technique was acquired by service in the army. This 
institutional training made them familiar with how to do 
the things demanded by social life, but it did not develop 
in them the ideals necessary to insure the doing of these 

1 Dewey, John, Democracy and Education, p. 130. 



326 The Principles of Education 

things. Social efficiency, as we have learned, requires 
more than a mere knowledge of means of control that 
serve social ends, it requires also ideals that lead men to 
seek these ends. When the school in early Athens was 
called upon to supplement the training given by the other 
institutions, its chief work became, therefore, to instill 
patriotic and religious ideals into the minds of the young. 
For this reason, literature and music were the main sub- 
jects taught in the didascaleum. This educational aim 
would be very inadequate for the school in modern times, 
when the activities of the industrial, political, and other 
forms of social institutions have become so very complex 
that these institutions, so far as their educative influence 
is concerned, fail not only to develop the ideals which they 
serve, but also to give control of the methods used in 
attaining these ideals. 

At a later period in Athenian education, knowledge was 
emphasized in school practice as the chief aim of educa- 
tion. Human welfare demanded the reorganization of 
social life. Institutions were degenerating; society was 
disintegrating; individualism was rife. Regulation de- 
vised by reason was needed to save men from the injurious 
results of individual caprice. Systems of philosophy, 
therefore, arose to answer the question, How should a 
man live in order to get the most out of life ? The insti- 
tutions of the time could not give such guidance; they 
had failed for the very lack of it. The teaching of ideas 
that should regulate life was turned over, therefore, to 
the school as supplementary to other institutions. The 
government required young men of the ephebic corps to 
study in the University of Athens, where knowledge was 
stressed. It is true that the reorganization of institutions 
in accordance with this new knowledge was not realized 



The Educational Process 327 

until the day of Roman supremacy, but the first step 
from the injurious results of individualism to a new social 
order was the development and dissemination of knowl- 
edge universally true to take the place of conflicting 
opinions. This is what Socrates, Plato, and other philoso- 
phers sought. Social welfare demanded it. After these 
general truths had guided in the reorganization of institu- 
tions, it became the duty of the school to assist in pre- 
paring men to meet new social demands which could not 
be satisfied by mere abstract ideas. When this was 
recognized, the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake as 
the chief aim of the school was stigmatized as unpractical. 
When the chief emphasis is given to the regulative 
influence of social authority, the aim of education appears 
as discipline. All education is disciplinary, because, by 
the use of social patterns, it regulates the development of 
the individual in the interest of social demands. Dis- 
cipline is emphasized as an aim of education when tradi- 
tion prolongs educational practices which social changes 
have made less useful, as in the case of the requiring of 
Latin after a wealth of literature and science had been 
written in the vernacular. As new conditions cause 
individuals to chafe under antiquated regulation, the 
disciplinary character of this regulation becomes con- 
spicuous. When, for example, social changes made in- 
dividuals dissatisfied with a strongly ascetic training, the 
fault was attributed to individual nature, and discipline 
became an educational aim. It was believed that the child 
had the " old Adam " in him and that his evil nature 
could be changed into good only through discipline. 
After scholasticism had gone to seed, the fault of being 
illogical was attributed to the individual and the need of 
logical discipline emphasized. More recent instances 



328 The Principles of Education 

may be found in the undue emphasis sometimes given to 
the formal study of language and mathematics. If the aim 
of education is restricted to discipline, social progress is 
checked, because the individual is subjected to an estab- 
lished order continued by force of tradition. 

In education organized for a leisure class, culture ap- 
peared to be the aim. All education is cultural in the 
sense that it enriches the nature of the individual by 
transferring to him a social inheritance. As an his- 
torical aim of education, the meaning of the term culture 
has been narrowed, however, so that it includes only 
those refinements which are not necessary for the work- 
a-day world, but which distinguish a leisure class regarded 
as superior to the common man. When the term culture 
is used properly to mean that which is added to the 
original nature of the individual, it is too indefinite to be 
useful as the aim of education. Since an individual can- 
not acquire all the cultural experience of the race, a 
useful aim must mark some forms of development as pref- 
erable to others. In realizing this more definite aim, the 
most valuable culture just as the most valuable dis- 
cipline is gained as a by-product. Culture in the narrow 
conventional sense tends to dissociate knowledge and 
appreciation from everyday practical activities, a con- 
dition in which true meanings and values decay. 1 

When new conditions make it evident that antiquated 
social regulations held over from earlier times as mere 
tradition are interfering with human welfare, individual 
development is stressed as the aim of education. When a 
change from customary practices is demanded, the re- 
sponsibility for making this change falls naturally to the 
rationalized work of the school. A conspicuous example 

1 See p. 145. 



The Educational Process 329 

of this aim is found in Rousseau's Emile. Because some 
antiquated social regulation was injurious, Rousseau 
assumed that all social regulation was injurious. This 
compelled him to seek educational guidance in the nature 
of the individual alone. Individual development as the 
aim of education was valuable in the peculiar conditions 
under which it arose, for it called attention to the fact 
that man is greater than institutions, that institutions 
should be in the service of human development, and that 
education should conform to, rather than be imposed 
upon, the nature of the individual. When society is not 
on the verge of revolution, individual development is, 
however, an inadequate aim, because it furnishes no 
criterion for selecting the best lines of development. 
There must be such selection, because the kinds of char- 
acter that the child may build vary greatly in value. Indi- 
vidual tendencies, which appear in the form of interests, 
are very unreliable guides in this matter; a person may 
be interested in doing evil as well as in doing good. The 
fact that activities which best develop the individual 
must be interesting to him does not mean that all acts 
which interest him promote his best development. Seek- 
ing educational guidance in the individual nature alone 
may mean indulging the child upon his own level without 
directing him to that which is more worth while. 

The theory of individual development advocated by 
Rousseau was mainly negative; it condemned arbitrary 
and injurious social regulation. When later thinkers 
attempted to construct an educational theory based upon 
the nature of the individual, they stated the aim of edu- 
cation as the harmonious development of all the powers of the 
individual. Opposed to traditional restrictions, they be- 
lieved that education was for the sake of humanity, 



330 The Principles of Education 

which was supposed to be revealed in the nature of each 
individual. Although individual interests differed, all 
men appeared to have in common certain powers, or 
faculties, such as sense perception, memory, imagination, 
and reasoning. Assuming that these general faculties 
could be developed by limited specific forms of exercise, 
they were enabled by this false doctrine of formal dis- 
cipline to make a plausible constructive theory. Although, 
so far as the science of psychology is concerned, the 
"faculty psychology/' which this doctrine assumes, is 
now a matter of the past, it still has a strong hold upon 
the popular mind. One can easily be misled by analogy 
to imagine that general powers of the mind, like the 
muscles of the body, can be strengthened through specific 
exercise, especially since the forgetting of the details of 
the subject matter studied does not seem to impair the 
mental ability gained through study. The most serious 
weakness of this analogy is the fact that the mind is not 
composed of "general faculties/' Such general faculties 
exist only as abstract ideas derived from the kinds of work 
for the performance of which the specific abilities of the 
mind may be organized ; they are not realities in the make- 
up of the mind. As Professor Dewey says with regard to 
the definition we are considering of the aim of education : 

If this definition be taken independently of social relationship we 
have no way of telling what is meant by any one of the terms em- 
ployed. We do not know what power is ; we do not know what de- 
velopment is ; we do not know what harmony is. A power is a power 
only with reference to the use to which it is put, the function it has 
to serve. .... We need to know the social situations in which the 
individual will have to use ability to observe, recollect, imagine, and 
reason, in order to have any way of telling what a training of mental 
powers actually means. 1 

1 Dewey, John, Moral Principles in Education, pp. 12-13. 



The Educational Process 331 

Since the powers of the individual are manifold and specific 
rather than few and general, and since the nature of these 
powers is revealed only in what they lead to in social life, 
this aim, which centers attention upon the individual, was 
useful in educational reconstruction only under peculiar 
social conditions in which individual nature was neglected. 
With the growth of democratic government in modern 
times, the need of loyalty of the individual to the state, 
intelligence in voting upon political issues, and efficiency 
in political office, caused good citizenship to be stressed as 
the aim of education. Thomas Jefferson wrote to George 
Washington : " It is an axiom in my mind that our lib- 
erty can never be safe but in the hands of the people them- 
selves, and that, too, of the people with a certain degree 
of instruction. This is the business of the state to effect 
and on a general plan." Later George Washington him- 
self sanctioned this idea in a message to Congress when 
he said : " Knowledge is in every country the surest basis 
of public happiness. In one in which the measures of 
government receive their impression so immediately as in 
ours from the sense of the community, it is proportion- 
ately essential." These statements were made in the day 
of the pioneer, when most forms of institutional life were 
comparatively simple. The more intricate problems of 
government made it a matter of serious importance that 
the people upon whom final judgment in political affairs 
rested should have a better preparation than that which 
came more or less incidentally from mere participation in 
social life. It became the duty of the school, therefore, 
to prepare for citizenship. However, as institutions other 
than the state grew more complex and needed the aid of 
the school to prepare for them, good citizenship became 
too narrow for the aim of education. 



332 The Principles of Education 

The skill required for success in the modern industrial 
life has placed so much emphasis upon the need of prepara- 
tion for making a living that many persons have been led 
to regard economic efficiency as the chief aim of educa- 
tion. Thus we have what is called the bread and butter 
aim. It is true that the social needs developed by the 
new industrialism put important obligations upon the 
school, since the individual can no longer acquire the neces- 
sary training by mere participation in industrial activi- 
ties. The fact that the bread and butter aim is only a 
temporary recognition of important social changes be- 
comes evident as soon as attention is called to the de- 
mands which institutions other than the industries are 
making upon the school. 

There is a tendency to enlarge the meaning of the one- 
sided aims when changing social conditions reveal their 
inadequacy. The aim of citizenship, for example, has 
been conceived by some to include preparation for life 
in all institutions. Since citizenship has specific refer- 
ence to the state as a political organization, the use of the 
term with this larger meaning is liable to be misleading 
by calling attention to the needs of one institution more 
than to the needs of others. If knowledge, morality, 
personal development, economic efficiency, or any other 
aim is meant to include efficiency in all institutional 
activities, i.e. social efficiency in the widest sense, no 
fault can be found with the aim,. but it should be expressed 
in terms that ordinarily stand for just what is meant and 
are not likely to mislead by stressing one part of the 
meaning and vaguely implying the rest. 



The Educational Process 333 



The growing complexity of institutional life, which requires the 
school to supplement the educational work of all other institutions, 
and also the scientific study of education have, in recent times, 
emphasized social efficiency as the aim of education. 

The rapidly increasing complexity of institutions and 
the scientific study of education have, in recent times, 
emphasized social efficiency as the aim of education. 
The marvelous advance in manufacturing and commerce 
through the use of scientific methods places increasingly 
difficult demands upon individual workers. The increas- 
ing scope of religious activities and the higher standards 
of home life have a similar result. Democratic govern- 
ment places ever greater responsibilities upon the indi- 
vidual citizens as the corporate interests of cities grow in 
complexity, as economic, moral, sanitary, and other forms 
of governmental regulation become more intricate, and 
as international relations become more far-reaching and 
complicated. All institutions must now appeal to the 
school for aid, because efficient participation in them 
requires much greater training than their educational 
influence can provide. This condition has. led men to 
recognize the aim of education as efficiency in all forms 
of institutional life. The growing responsibilities of the 
school have, moreover, led educators to seek the aid of 
science in solving their problems. The scientific study of 
human nature points conclusively to social efficiency as the 
aim of education. This fact will be explained later. 1 

1 See pp. 345-346. 



334 The Principles of Education 

VI 

Social efficiency as the aim of education neither interferes with 
social growth by fixing present practices nor dwarfs individual 
personality by social regulation. 

If the aim of the school is to prepare individuals to 
meet the social demands, does not the school tend to fix 
present practices and thus interfere with social growth? 
On the contrary, it promotes social development. 
Through history and the fine arts, it shows the intrinsic 
values of practices and thus dispels the fog of formal 
tradition, which is most potent in keeping civilization 
on a dead level. An understanding of the purpose of a 
practice gives the only possible criterion for improving it ; 
one means is better than another only because it realizes 
the purpose more effectively. Also by training individ- 
uals in the latest scientific means of control, the school 
gives the best possible preparation for finding still more 
effective methods. Social life demands not merely the 
acquiring of purposes and means of control already de- 
fined by social patterns; it demands also progress in 
developing new purposes and new methods. The school 
gives the basis from which this advance is made, and also 
the methods whereby improvement may be attained. 
Historians and artists, scientists and inventors, workers 
in every field who contribute to the improvement of insti- 
tutions, are prepared by education to do their work. 

Does not social efficiency as the aim of education 
require that individual personality be dwarfed by social 
regulation? On the contrary, this aim promotes the de- 
velopment of individual personality. The advance of 
civilization means larger opportunities for personal devel- 
opment. The highest efficiency requires not a mere com- 



The Educational Process 335 

pliance with the formal demands of group life, but an 
appreciation and intelligent cooperation with others in 
realizing values which each individual feels to be worth 
while as a better condition of the self, and which he seeks 
not in compliance with an external social command, but 
in willing submission to his own inner appreciations of 
worth. He finds the highest authority for social demands 
not without, but within himself. As Mackenzie says 
regarding education, in discussing one of its important 
services : " It is designed to suggest the relations of par- 
ticular employments, not merely to the whole with which 
they are immediately connected, but to the system of life 
whose ends all particular employments subserve. It is 
intended, in short, to stimulate that intelligent appre- 
ciation of purposes which makes almost the meanest 
employment interesting, and thus at the same time to 
incite that spirit of service which makes almost the 
humblest action ' fine/ ' n In realizing his purposes, the 
individual would be helpless without social guidance in 
control. Social efficiency prepares the individual, fur- 
thermore, for originality ■ in development, because it pre- 
pares him to assist in social advance and to adapt himself 
to changing conditions of life. 



VII 

The school cannot through education remake institutions in 
accordance with some ideal of a perfect society, but is limited in 
its teachings to the highest social development of the time. 

Does not the purpose of education as defined limit 
the school to preparing individuals for participation in 
an imperfect society, whereas the school should use its 

1 Mackenzie, J. S., An Introduction to Social Philosophy, p. 418. 



336 The Principles of Education 

educative influence to remake social institutions in ac- 
cordance with some ideal of a perfect society? Perfection 
cannot be attained in a day ; the improving of institutions 
is a slow and never ending process. History, the fine 
arts, philosophy, ethics, economics, jurisprudence, politi- 
cal science, sociology, together with the physical and 
biological sciences, are at work in each institution con- 
tributing towards its improvement. The school is limited 
to transmitting purposes and means of control that have 
already been developed, tried, and found valuable; it 
cannot go beyond the best social conditions of the time, 
however imperfect they may be. Guiding individuals 
to the best that has been attained, it prepares them to 
contribute to social progress by taking steps in advance, 
but the school itself does not make directly these con- 
tributions. The socialized individual in whose develop- 
ment the school was a factor, and not the school, is respon- 
sible for creating those higher purposes and more effective 
means of control that mark the pathway towards the 
millennium. If this is done by men connected with the 
school, it is done not in the process of educating, but in 
research and artistic creation. 



VIII 

The ' educative work of all institutions should be rationalized. 
In rationalizing the work of the school, the most important prob- 
lems are those of selecting and organizing the curriculum and of 
finding the methods of teaching. These two problems are closely- 
related, one emphasizing the content of the subject matter and 
the other emphasizing the form in which this content is presented. 

Having found the aim of education, let us now consider 
the means for realizing this aim. That the purpose of 
education is to increase efficiency is patent in institutions 



The Educational Process 337 

other than the school ; but, since education here is only 
incidental, the means for realizing this aim are usually 
not rationalized with a view to making them as effective 
as possible. Little provision is made to vitalize the 
activities of the worker by developing in him strong 
appreciation of the intrinsic social value of what he does ; 
the practical difficulties he meets, and, consequently, the 
truths he acquires in overcoming them, appear in acci- 
dental order rather than in an order that would enable 
him to acquire this knowledge most economically; the 
assistance of others in teaching him is seldom guided by 
an adequate understanding of the process through which 
individuals acquire means of control. 

So far as an institution must educate for the sake of 
attaining its essential purpose, this education, just as 
truly as any other means used for attaining the purpose of 
the institution, should be rationalized in order to make it 
as effective as possible. This is true with regard to all 
institutions, — the home, the industries, the state, and 
the church, as well as the school. The educational work 
done by the other institutions is no less important, so far 
as it goes, than the educational work of the school, and 
should, therefore, be done intelligently. Numerous in- 
stances of the recognition of this truth may be found. 
Some of the larger factories and department stores employ 
persons whose duty it is to improve the abilities of the 
employees; magazines for mothers have departments of 
education as well as of household arts ; the church has long 
made use of the Sunday school. 

Since the main purpose of the school is to educate, its 
activities have been rationally organized, to a greater or 
less degree, with a view to this purpose. This rational 
organization is true especially of the formal work of the 



338 The Principles of Education 

classroom. The educational possibilities of many other 
activities of the school have been comparatively neg- 
lected. Discipline, sanitary regulations, games for recre- 
ation, athletics, dramatics, social meetings, the reading of 
library books for the enjoyment of leisure time, entertain- 
ments, celebrations, activities of literary, musical, and 
handicraft clubs, — indeed, all activities of the school 
should be capitalized for education, if the school is to 
realize to the fullest extent the purpose which called it 
into being. When the possible educational influence of 
activities not included in the formal work of the class- 
room is recognized, the wider service which the school 
can render not only to the pupils enrolled but also to the 
community in general becomes at once apparent. 

Since the aim of the school is to supplement the educa- 
tional influence of the other institutions in making the 
individual socially efficient, the first problem that appears 
logically in realizing this aim is to find what purposes and 
means of control should be given by the school. A study 
of the social conditions of the time is the first step in 
answering this problem. Sparta, endangered by slaves 
within and foes without, required that the youths receive 
special training to develop in them ideals of patriotism 
and skill in warfare. When in the Roman state the 
welfare of society demanded a class of individuals wise in 
leadership and strong in persuasion, schools of grammar 
and rhetoric were provided to meet this need. In the 
early Benedictine monasteries, where social regulation 
required that men read and study the Scriptures, and 
participate in religious worship, which included among 
other things singing and observing holy days, it was 
necessary for the school to teach reading, writing, the 
Scriptures, music, and enough astronomy and mathe- 



The Educational Process 339 

matics to determine the calendar. In the age of chivalry, 
social life demanded that knights serve lord, lady, and 
church, and have some innocent employment for leisure 
hours. The character of the special training, which in- 
cluded such activities as serving tables, jousting, and 
playing chess, was determined by these demands. At the 
time of the Protestant Reformation, the school was given 
the responsibility of training youths in religion together 
with reading and writing as necessary accompaniments 
of this. In the modern democratic and industrial age, 
all forms of institutional life require supplementary aid 
from the school. 

The selection of the purposes and the means of control 
which the school undertakes to develop has been guided, 
for the most part, by mere rule of thumb. Under simpler 
social conditions, this method sufficed, but now that the 
demands of institutional life have become very intricate 
and subtle, the school cannot meet its obligations with- 
out a thoroughly rationalized investigation of the respon- 
sibilities which social welfare places upon it. 

The purposes and means of control which society leaves 
to the school to develop constitute the curriculum when 
they are organized with reference to the various kinds of 
potential abilities and various degrees of immaturity of 
those to be educated. The highest efficiency requires 
specialization in addition to certain abilities which all 
must acquire in common. Because of the highly devel- 
oped division of labor in social life, groups of individuals 
must be trained in special lines of activity for which they 
are best fitted. It would be wasteful of human energy, 
moreover, to attempt to develop in the individual ad- 
vanced purposes and means of control in those years of 
his life when, on account of his immaturity, he could 



340 The Principles of Education 

acquire them only with great difficulty, if at all. During 
this period of infancy, the child must be dependent upon 
others for protection and support where he is deficient in 
meeting social demands. 

The purposes and means of control included in the 
curriculum are objective and tangible only when they are 
embodied in some material form such as physical activi- 
ties, science, literature, and history. These forms, as we 
have learned, are patterns which guide individuals to new 
knowledge and new appreciation. Many of them are 
fashioned, however, to guide only highly developed indi- 
viduals. The sciences are logically organized and the 
fine arts are often based upon values which are not appre- 
ciated by the immature individual. Both may be un- 
suited for these reasons to guide directly the development 
of the immature pupil. Their use is to mark the pur- 
poses and means of control which the individual should 
have after he has been subjected to the guidance of the 
school ; they show the possibilities of individual develop- 
ment. Just as mature plants reveal the value and sig- 
nificance of the seeds from which they developed, so the 
purposes and means of control selected for the curriculum 
reveal the value and significance of various tendencies of 
the immature individual, since these tendencies may in 
time develop into them. 

Since the curriculum is selected primarily with ref- 
erence to the kinds of purposes and means of control 
required to meet social demands rather than with refer- 
ence to the forms in which these appear as patterns for 
guiding directly the development of the individual, the 
solution of the problem of selecting the curriculum does 
not meet all difficulties which the school must overcome 
in realizing the aim of education. As soon as the course 



The Educational Process 341 

of study has been selected, there appears the problem of 
translating it into forms suited to guide the varied and 
immature experience of the pupils. The more immature 
the pupils are, the more prominent is this problem. It 
may be decided that the highest social efficiency requires 
an appreciation of the value of following the Lord as 
represented by the Twenty-Third Psalm. This psalm, as 
we have found, 1 is a pattern for guiding individuals to ac- 
quire an appreciation of this value. It was written, how- 
ever, to guide mature people who lived a pastoral life, who 
developed under conditions quite different from those of 
modern times. It presupposes appreciations which they 
had, but which a child under conditions of modern life 
does not have. Before he can profit by this literary 
pattern, he must not merely understand the meaning of 
the words, but must feel an appreciation for the good 
shepherd, green pastures, still waters, and other values 
which the poem is intended to call to mind. An appre- 
ciation of these values must be developed out of apprecia- 
tions he already has before the poem can even begin to 
guide his experience. In science, the laws of sound, heat, 
and light are stated in logical form suited to the mature 
mind ; they are meaningless to the pupil until on the 
basis of his fund of acquired experience he has been guided 
to a knowledge of aerial, molecular, and ethereal vibra- 
tions, and of other things an understanding of which the 
logical statement of these laws presupposes. This prob- 
lem is made all the more difficult by the fact that pupils, 
even those of the same age and opportunities, vary greatly 
in the basis of experience which must be developed so 
that the patterns selected in the course of study can be 
effective. This difficulty makes necessary the teacher, who 
i See pp. 219-221. 



342 The Principles of Education 

not only must have the experience represented by the 
curriculum, but also must know the methods of teaching in 
order to guide the pupil to acquire this experience. These 
methods rest upon laws, or principles, in accordance with 
which the individual acquires new purposes and new 
means of control. Only by conforming to these laws can 
the teacher guide the pupil to realize in his experience the 
purposes and means of control which the curriculum has 
marked as essential to social efficiency. 

While the complex problem of the school may be simplified 
by dividing it into the two problems of what should be in- 
cluded in the curriculum and what methods should be 
used in teaching, the curriculum and the methods should not 
be considered as separate in reality. They are two aspects 
of the same thing. In the one case the content of the sub- 
ject matter is emphasized and in the other the form in 
which this content is presented is emphasized. The cur- 
riculum is always embodied in the form of social patterns 
for purposes and means of control, and the methods of 
teaching are always concerned with developing these pur- 
poses and means of control. As Professor Dewey says : 

The idea that mind and the world of things and persons are two 
separate and independent realms . . . carries with it the conclusion that 
method and subject matter of instruction are separate affairs. Subject 
matter then becomes a ready-made systematized classification of the 
facts and principles of the world of nature and man. Method then has 
for its province a consideration of the ways in which this antecedent 
subject matter may be best presented to and impressed upon the 
mind ; or, a consideration of the ways in which the mind may be 
externally brought to bear upon the matter so as to facilitate its 
acquisition and possession. . . . Method means that arrangement 
of subject matter which makes it most effective in use. Never is 
method something outside of the material. 1 

1 Dewey, John, Democracy and Education, pp. 193-194. 



The Educational Process 343 



IX 

The problems of the school must ever be solved anew ; for, if the 
school is not plastic to change, its practices eventually lose connec- 
tion with the ever changing social order, upon which their sig- 
nificance and value depend. 

The problems of the school must ever be solved anew ; 
for the school must keep pace with social development. 
(1) When other institutions develop so as to require 
further preparation on the part of the individuals who 
participate in them, but do not increase in educational 
influence, the obligations of the school are enlarged. 
New lines of specialization in the work of all institutions 
illustrate this fact. (2) Changes in the educational work 
of other institutions modify the obligations of the school, 
as when the disappearance of the apprenticeship system 
in industries increased the obligation of the school to give 
industrial training. (3) The school itself like other insti- 
tutions changes from time to time as better technique 
for realizing its fundamental aim is developed. The 
improvement of scientific methods of investigation in the 
field of education makes possible better and better solu- 
tions of the problems of what should be in the curriculum 
and how it should be taught. The school has thus a 
development peculiar to itself. 

If the school is not plastic to change, its practices 
eventually become antiquated. Practices once useful are 
then continued under social conditions with which they 
have no useful connection. No longer in the service of 
social life, they become mere school activities. They are 
ends in themselves, because they have no further sig- 
nificance. This condition affects both curriculum and 
methods of teaching, since the two are inseparable. At 



344 The Principles of Education 

the time of disintegration in the ancient Athenian state, 
social welfare required the reconstruction of institutions 
on a rational basis. The teaching of philosophic theories, 
which arose in answer to this need, soon became the chief 
work of schools founded by philosophers. Later, when 
pure theory had satisfied the social demand which called it 
into being and new social needs called for a more immedi- 
ately practical education, the purely theoretical curriculum, 
continued by force of tradition, became an end in itself, a 
mere school requirement. It ceased to be a means for 
adequately preparing men to participate in the changed 
social life. Theory became thus separated from practice. 
To recall another familiar instance, Latin at the time of 
the Italian Renaissance was introduced into the school as 
a means of access to the knowledge considered to be most 
worth while. After a wealth of books had appeared in 
modern tongues and Latin was no longer all-important as 
a means of learning, it still, through force of tradition, 
retained its former place in the curriculum. To the degree 
that the need of it in preparation for social action de- 
creased, the study of Latin became an end in itself, a 
mere school activity. Likewise, when scholasticism lost 
its social importance, it became a mere school practice, and 
when industrial democracy demanded new forms of educa- 
tion, a curriculum designed to satisfy the needs of a leisure 
aristocratic class lost its vital connection with life outside 
the school. 

The school finds its highest salvation only when it loses 
itself in the service of other institutions. Activities that 
have no significance beyond the school are void of educa- 
tional value and foreign to its purpose. Since the school 
was called into being to supplement the educational work 
of other institutions in preparing individuals for efficient 



The Educational Process 345 

participation in them, the purposes and means of control 
embodied in the curriculum should be those vital in the life 
of other institutions. The essential guide for methods of 
teaching, also, is found in the nature of institutional activi- 
ties. " The only way to prepare for social life is to engage 
in social life." 1 In order to appreciate the values of pur- 
poses, the individual must engage in activities in the 
service of them ; in order to understand the real meanings 
of things, he must use them in a normal way. In solving 
the problems of what should constitute the curriculum 
and of how the subject matter selected should be taught, 
the school must look for guidance to the processes of life 
in other institutions, which alone give to the school its 
true meaning and value. 



In explaining how education selects and transmits to immature 
organisms forms of adjustment developed in group life, natural 
science supports the conclusions given above with regard to the 
aim of education, the relation of the school to other institutions, 
and the fundamental importance of the problems of the curriculum 
and of the methods of teaching. 

Let us now find whether natural science supports the 
conclusions we have reached with regard to the nature 
of the educational process. 

We have found from the materialistic point of view 
that the educative process unites the individual and 
social processes. 2 The human organism is born with an 
incomplete nervous system. Reactions such as breathing 
and swallowing, which are necessary for life, are fully 
provided for; but the great majority of useful reactions 
are acquired after birth as the result of the direct influence 

1 Dewey, John, Moral Principles in Education, p. 14. 2 Pp. 43-45. 



346 The Principles of Education 

of other organisms or of the changes which these organ- 
isms have made in the environment. In this way, each 
organism profits by the forms of reaction acquired by the 
race in many generations of progressive adjustment to 
environment. These acquired reactions serve to make 
the individual socially efficient, because they are forms of 
adjustment developed in group life, in which division of 
activities among various organisms makes the group the 
unit for adjustment. 

The educative process selects forms of adjustment, 
which appear on the mental side as purposes and means 
of control, and adapts these to immature organisms. 
Forms of adjustment must be selected, because the main- 
tenance of group life from generation to generation de- 
pends upon each organism's acquiring the special set of 
reactions that constitute the part it takes in group adjust- 
ment, and also because human evolution depends upon 
the transmission of the best reactions developed by the 
group and the elimination of the inferior reactions. The 
forms of adjustment selected are acquired by the indi- 
vidual organism only when adapted to its nature, for the 
development of new nerve connections depends upon those 
already made and takes place only in accordance with 
certain laws. 

All larger organizations of group habits which corre- 
spond to institutions educate. A factory selects from all 
possible reactions those which are most effective in pro- 
ducing some commodity. Through interaction with the 
peculiar environment in the factory, including the equip- 
ment and the organisms that have acquired the necessary 
adjustments, the beginner is guided to appropriate reac- 
tions. The factory that fails to do its part either in 
selecting reactions or in transmitting them to the work- 



The Educational Process 347 

men goes to the wall in the competitive struggle. What 
is true of this form of industrial life is true of all institu- 
tions. When institutional forms of adjustment became 
so complex that all could not be transmitted by the insti- 
tution, the progress of adjustment was checked until group 
activities which did transmit them were developed. This 
step was the next essential in evolution. These group 
activities which supplement the educational work of other 
institutions constitute the school. 

In the fact that the function of education in all institu- 
tions is to promote group adjustment, which improves 
through a gradual process of variation and natural selec- 
tion, and which involves development of both the group 
as a unit and of the individual organisms within the group, 
we find natural science supporting our conclusions that 
social efficiency as the widest aim of education includes all 
other valid aims, that the aim of social efficiency provides 
for both social growth and personal development, and that 
the school cannot quickly perfect society. 

Since the elimination of useless activities in the process 
of education and the effective organization of useful ones 
result in better adjustment, and since this elimination 
and organization appear on the side of consciousness as a 
process of rationalization, natural science supports our 
conclusion that the educative work of all institutions 
should be rationalized. In this process of rationalization, 
the problems of selecting the curriculum and of devising 
methods of teaching are fundamental, because they are 
the mental accompaniments of checks in the essential 
educational reactions of selecting forms of adjustment and 
of adapting them to individual organisms. Because of 
the supplementary relation of the school to other group 
activities, which are continually changing, effective cd- 



348 The Principles of Education 

justment requires that the forms of adjustment selected 
and adapted to the immature organisms be modified from 
time to time. This means on the mental side that prob- 
lems of the school must ever be solved anew. 

REFERENCES 

Munsterberg, H., Psychology and the Teacher, 1910, pp. 64-70. 
(Gives a brief and clear discussion of the aims of education.) 

Butler, N. M., The Meaning of Education, 1905, pp. 3-34. (Gives a 
general discussion of what education means.) 

Moore, E. C, What is Education ? 1915, pp. 170-194. (Gives a dis- 
cussion of learning by and for doing.) 

Betts, G. H., Social Principles of Education, 1913, pp. 55-93. (Dis- 
cusses clearly the educational significance of institutions.) 

Bolton, F. E., Principles of Education, 1911, pp. 1-7. (Points out the 
educational influence of various institutions.) 

Ruediger, W. C., The Principles of Education, 1910, pp. 244-258. 
(Discusses the social agencies that educate.) 

Bagley, W. C., The Educative Process, 1907, pp. 23-39. (Discusses 
the function of the school.) 

MacVannel, J. A., Outline of a Course in the Philosophy of Education, 
1912, pp. 176-181. (Discusses the school as a social institution.) 

Dewey, J., The School and Society, 1915, pp. 3-28. (Considers the 
school from the social point of view.) 

Dewey, J., Democracy and Education, 1916, pp. 117-121. (Explains 
the nature of an educational aim. Valuable especially for ad- 
vanced students.) 

Bagley, W. C, The Educative Process, 1907, pp. 40-65. (Discusses 
the various aims of education and gives support to social 
efficiency as the aim.) 

Bagley, W. C, Educational Values, 1911, pp. 107-116. (Criticizes 
objections to the social aim of education.) 

Strayer, G. D., A Brief Course in the Teaching Process, 1911, pp. 
1-10. (Gives a brief and clear discussion of the aim of educa- 
tion.) 

Ruediger, W. C, The Principles of Education, 1910, pp. 38-85. 
(Discusses the aims of education.) 



The Educational Process 349 



PROBLEMS 

1. Explain the following: "When we hear it sometimes said, 
'All education must start with the child,' we must add, 'Yes, and 
lead to human civilization ; ' and when we hear it said, on the other 
hand, that all education must start from the traditional past, we must 
add, 'Yes, and be adapted to the child.'" — Nicholas Murray Butler. 

2. Name five things you have learned through the influence of 
each of the following institutions respectively : the home, the church, 
the state. 

3. What new responsibility has the great division of labor in recent 
years placed upon the school? 

4. What are the educational functions of the home and the church 
respectively ? 

5. Under what conditions is the church justified in using its 
resources to support colleges? 

6. What is the nature of educational value? 

7. Why must we know the aim of education before we can deter- 
mine what the curriculum and the methods of teaching should be ? 

8. Explain how you would determine whether a high school 
graduate is socially efficient. 

9. Ask five persons in various kinds of employment what they 
consider to be the value of an education and compare the answers given 
with the aims of education discussed in this chapter. 

10. Is the fact that a subject is interesting to the pupils sufficient 
justification for including it in the school curriculum? Explain. 

11. Criticize the statement that the function of education is to 
give general ideas. 

12. State and criticize the doctrine of formal discipline. 

13. What justification is there for the following: (a) making a 
common school education compulsory, (6) using the taxes collected 
from the people in the more wealthy districts towards the support of 
schools in poorer districts, (c) appropriating public funds to provide 
free textbooks for pupils in the public schools, (d) expending for the 
education of students in a state university part of the taxes collected 
from parents financially unable to send their own sons and daughters 
to the university? 

14. How are the following related: subject matter, curriculum, 
methods of teaching, learning? 



CHAPTER XII 

THE PRINCIPLES UNDERLYING THE MAKING OF 
THE CURRICULUM 

Making the curriculum intelligently requires that we begin 
with the immature equipment of purposes and means of control 
with which the child comes to school, allow for those which other 
institutions normally give him, and then find what subject 
matter will best guide him, from stage to stage of his develop- 
ment, in acquiring the purposes and means of control necessary 
for efficient participation in social life. In order to do this, we 
must find (1) what constitutes social efficiency, (2) what edu- 
cation the individual receives from institutions other than the 
school, (3) what is the nature of the immature experience to be 
guided by social patterns, and (4) what is the nature of each 
unit of subject matter available for guiding this experience. 

I 

The problem of making the curriculum may be simplified by 
separating it into the four problems noted above. The final test 
of the accuracy with which the curriculum has been made is 
found in the social efficiency of those who have been educated under 
its guidance, provided the methods of teaching are not at fault. 

The problem of making the curriculum for the school is 
that of selecting and organizing social patterns which, in 
supplementing the educational work of other institutions, 
point out the most economical steps in development from 
the meager and crude purposes and means of control which 
guide the activities of the child to those necessary for 
efficient participation in social life. As Professor Dewey 

350 



The Making of the Curriculum 351 

says with regard to the subject matter which constitutes 
the curriculum : 

Abandon the notion of subject matter as something fixed and ready- 
made in itself, outside the child's experience; cease thinking of the 
child's experience as also something hard and fast; see it as some- 
thing fluent, embryonic, vital ; and we realize that the child and the 
curriculum are simply two limits which define a single process. Just 
as two points define a straight line, so the present standpoint of the 
child and the facts and truths of studies define instruction. It is 
continuous reconstruction, moving from the child's present experience 
out into that represented by the organized bodies of truth that we call 
studies. 1 

The first step in solving the complex problem of making 
the curriculum is to separate it into the simpler problems 
which it includes. These simpler problems can then be 
considered one at a time. The most fundamental guide in 
choosing patterns is a knowledge of what is to be made. 
This is as true in the choosing of patterns to develop a 
human being as it is true in the choosing of patterns to 
make a dress, construct a machine, or build a house. 
Since the curriculum is selected as a guide in making 
individuals socially efficient, we must know (1) what con- 
stitutes social efficiency. Since the school supplements the 
educational work of other institutions and need not, there- 
fore, undertake to do what may safely be left to them, we 
must know (2) what education the individual receives from 
other institutions. By subtracting from the social demands 
upon the individual those which are satisfied through 
training in other institutions, we can find those for the 
satisfaction of which the school is responsible. We must 
find next (3) what is the nature of the immature experience 
to which the social patterns are to be applied. This imma- 
1 Dewey, John, The Child and the Curriculum, p. 16. 



352 The Principles of Education 

ture experience is the " material " with which the school 
must work in education. If the patterns do not fit it, 
they are useless. Before any pattern can be chosen intel- 
ligently, we must know (4) what is the nature of the pattern 
itself; for each pattern of subject matter is a special form 
of guidance from purposes and means already acquired to 
new ones based upon them. 

When these problems have been solved, we are ready 
to make an intelligent choice of patterns, or subject matter, 
for the school curriculum. Beginning with the immature 
equipment of purposes and means of control with which 
the child comes to school, and allowing for those which 
other institutions will normally give to him, we can find 
what subject matter will guide him most effectively, from 
stage to stage of his development, in acquiring the pur- 
poses and the means of control necessary for his efficient 
participation in social life. 

In finding the details of the curriculum, we must ever 
be guided by this question : What must the school pre- 
pare the individual to do in each of the kinds of activity 
normally required of him in the social life ? It is clearly 
evident that, if the school is to prepare the pupil to be a 
carpenter, we must, in making the curriculum, find through 
trade analysis the details of the work which a carpenter 
is normally required to do, such as casing a window, 
fitting and hanging a door, and mitering a base-board. 
Likewise, we must find through analysis the details of 
all the kinds of activities for which the school is to pre- 
pare the pupil, including the various wider social activi- 
ties, such as those required of a citizen. Then the cur- 
riculum should be so made that the purposes which the 
pupil needs to appreciate and the processes which he 
needs intelligently to control in order to do these things 



The Making of the Curriculum 353 

most efficiently are developed in his experience through 
the use of subject matter adapted to his experience and 
related to projects which he willingly undertakes as 
meaningful and worth while. A curriculum of this 
nature provides the pupil with activities that are signifi- 
cant and valuable from his own point of view, and at the 
same time prepares him for greater service from the 
point of view of society. The appropriate subject 
matter, as we have learned, 1 not only is a guide to the 
true appreciation and the intelligent control of present 
practices, but leads also to the development of new 
purposes and of new means of control which promote 
social development. 

Much subject matter that is essential to social action 
cannot be used with advantage until the pupil has had 
years of development. In the meantime, he must be 
protected and cared for in so far as, because of imma- 
turity, he lacks self-dependence. For years he must be 
fed, clothed, and sheltered; and he must also be safe- 
guarded by laws and regulations in the making of which 
he has no voice. 

The final test of the accuracy with which the problem 
of the curriculum has been solved is found in the social 
efficiency of those educated under the guidance of the cur- 
riculum ; for the test of any means is found in its effec- 
tiveness in securing the end for which it was devised. 
Whatever secures this end more fully and with greater 
economy of time and energy is an improvement. It is 
true that the curriculum is not the only means used in 
realizing the aim of education. Inefficiency of the grad- 
uates of a school or relatively slow development of its 
pupils may be due not to a faulty curriculum, but to 

1 P. 334. 



354 The Principles of Education 

faulty methods of teaching. If the school does not real- 
ize the purpose for which it was established and realize 
this purpose economically, the curriculum is, however, 
one of the factors which must be critically examined in 
locating the fault. Social demands may have been mis- 
understood ; institutions other than the school may have 
been depended upon for guidance which they did not 
give ; the subject matter may not have been used at the 
most opportune time in the developing experience of the 
pupil ; the kinds of guidance normally given by various 
patterns, or units of subject matter, may have been mis- 
judged. If there is some fault in the school, these are the 
matters with respect to which the curriculum should be 
critically examined in order to find whether the fault lies 
in it. 

The complexity of the problem makes improving the 
curriculum a slow process. In order to make genuine 
progress, the present curriculum, which is the outcome of 
much social experience, should be changed only when the 
value of the modification is clearly demonstrated in the 
light of the principles presented in this chapter. 

In solving the four simpler problems into which the 
complex problem of the curriculum has been divided, we 
must depend upon opinion in so far as science, on account 
of its youth, has not made investigations and arrived at 
accurate conclusions. Opinion is hypothesis not ade- 
quately tested; it is the forerunner of science, needing 
only to stand accurate and conclusive tests in order to 
be converted into scientific truth. In the absence of 
scientific conclusions, opinion is the best guide available. 
Step by step, in a slow but sure progress, science is, how- 
ever, replacing opinion by its more reliable conclusions. 
To the extent that this is done in the field of education, 



The Making of the Curriculum 355 

the problem of the curriculum will be more accurately 
solved. 

The analysis made of the complex problem of the cur- 
riculum is a necessary step in the forming of better judg- 
ments of opinion; because the simpler the problem, the 
easier it is to form an accurate opinion of the solution. 
This analysis sets, furthermore, the problems for science 
to solve with its accurate methods, for the first step in 
scientific investigation is to find the simplest problems 
into which the complex one can be divided. The situa- 
tion here is analogous to that of the fabled bundle of 
sticks which were broken more easily one at a time than 
all together. 

Each of the four fundamental problems that must be 
solved in making intelligently the curriculum may, in 
turn, be simplified through further analysis so that it can 
be solved with greater ease and accuracy. 



II ' 

The problem of finding what constitutes social efficiency may be 
simplified through subdivision by finding what purposes and means 
of control are required for efficient participation in each of the five 
great institutional elements of social life. Subject matter selected 
in the service of demands which these institutions make upon all in- 
dividuals in common should constitute the required courses in the 
curriculum ; subject matter selected in the service of various insti- 
tutional demands which division of labor makes upon different 
groups of individuals only, should constitute the elective courses in 
the curriculum. 

In finding what society requires of the individual for 
effective participation in social action, we must distin- 
guish between what social action itself requires and what 
traditional and arbitrary popular beliefs hold these re- 
quirements to be. At one time, popular opinion required 



356 The Principles of Education 

that the school teach the subtle speculations of scholas- 
ticism. A man who could " define " and " debate " was 
considered educated. The scholastic curriculum did not, 
however, provide for many of the most serious needs of 
life, such as relief from poverty and injustice, which were 
widely prevalent. Popular opinion demanded later that 
the school stress knowledge of Latin forms, and of more 
or less useless historical and literary facts. No argument 
is needed to show that this demand was artificial. The 
history of civilization tells of the frequent sacrifice of real 
social needs to false popular opinion of what the curricu- 
lum should contain. Even now we are by no means free 
from this, as may be seen in the undue emphasis often 
given to the study of formal grammar and arithmetic. 
We cannot rely upon the popular demands to reveal the 
genuine social needs, however strong the social influences 
enforcing these demands may be. Only by a direct, pains- 
taking, and unprejudiced study of what the very nature 
of our social life requires for securing the highest welfare 
of human beings can we find the social needs which should 
be provided for in the curriculum. 

Systematic study of the needs of social life must seek 
first to simplify the problems involved by reducing social 
life to its elements. These elements of society, as explained 
in the chapter on social development, are institutions, 
which may be classified as the home, the industries, the 
state, the church, and the school. The social demands 
are made up of what is needed for efficient participation in 
each of these institutional elements of society. If such 
analysis of social life js not made, attention given to one 
institution may obscure the claims of others. This was 
the case when the Reformation centered attention upon 
religious education, when the needs of democratic govern- 



The Making of the Curriculum 357 

ment emphasized education for citizenship, and when 
industrial needs made vocational training prominent. 

The kind of analysis required to select intelligently the 
curriculum may be found in Herbert Spencer's essay 
entitled What Knowledge Is of Most Worth? He says: 

How to live ? — that is the essential question for us. Not how to 
live in the mere material sense only, but in the widest sense. The 
general problem which comprehends every special problem is — the 
right ruling of conduct in all directions under all circumstances. In 
what way to treat the body ; in what way to treat the mind ; in what 
way to manage our affairs; in what way to bring up a family; in 
what way to behave as a citizen ; in what way to utilize all those 
sources of happiness which nature supplies — how to use all our 
faculties to the greatest advantage of ourselves and others — how to 
live completely? And this being the great thing needful for us to 
learn, is, by consequence, the great thing which education has to teach. 
To prepare us for complete living is the function which education has 
to discharge ; and the only rational mode of judging of any educational 
course is, to judge in what degree it discharges such function. 

This test, never used in its entirety, but rarely even partially used, 
and used then in a vague, half conscious way, has to be applied con- 
sciously, methodically, and throughout all cases. It behooves us to 
set before ourselves, and ever to keep clearly in view, complete living 
as the end to be achieved ; so that in bringing up our children we may 
choose subjects and methods of instruction, with deliberate reference 
to this end. Not only ought we to cease from the mere unthinking 
adoption of the current fashion in education, which has no better 
warrant than any other fashion ; but we must also rise above that rude, 
empirical style of judging displayed by those more intelligent people, 
who do bestow some care in overseeing the cultivation of their chil- 
dren's minds. It must not suffice simply to think that such or such 
information will be useful in after life, or that this kind of knowledge is 
of more practical value than that ; but we must seek out some process 
of estimating their respective values, so that as far as possible we may 
positively knoiv which are most deserving of attention. 

Doubtless the task is difficult — perhaps never to be more than 
approximately achieved. But, considering the vastness of the in- 
terests at stake, its difficulty is no reason for pusillanimously passing 



358 The Principles of Education 

it by ; but rather for devoting every energy to its mastery. And if 
we only proceed systematically, we may very soon get at results of 
no small moment. 

Our first step must obviously be to classify, in the order of their 
importance, the leading kinds of activity which constitute human life. 
They may be naturally arranged into : — 1. Those activities which 
directly minister to self-preservation ; 2. Those activities which, by 
securing the necessaries of life, indirectly minister to self-preservation ; 
3. Those activities which have for their end the rearing and discipline 
of offspring ; 4. Those activities which are involved in the mainte- 
nance of proper social and political relations ; 5. Those miscellaneous 
activities which make up the leisure part of life, devoted to the grati- 
fication of the tastes and feelings. 1 

In classifying the activities for which the individual 
should be prepared, Spencer has grouped them practically 
according to the institutional elements of society. " Those 
activities which, by securing the necessaries of life, indi- 
rectly minister to self-preservation " belong to the indus- 
tries; "those activities which have for their end the 
rearing and discipline of offspring "belong to the home; 
" those activities which are involved in the maintenance 
of proper social and political relations " belong to the 
state. The two additional classes of activities enumer- 
ated by Spencer are in the service of all institutions. 
This is clearly evident in the case of " those activities 
which directly minister to self-preservation." Since the 
body is the " instrument " through which man acts, its 
preservation is in the interest of all that he does. " Those 
miscellaneous activities which make up the leisure part of 
life, devoted to the gratification of the tastes and feel- 
ings," develop ideals which guide in all institutional life; 
for music, poetry, painting, etc., to the enjoyment of which 

1 Spencer, Herbert, Education: Intellectual, Moral and Physical, 
1890, pp. 14-16. 



The Making of the Curriculum 359 

Spencer here refers, are valuable not primarily because 
they give refined enjoyment, but because they develop 
purposes. 1 As Spencer's essay is written in the interest 
of the school, the only institution that waits for recogni- 
tion by him is the church. Although he does not refer 
to religion in his enumeration of the five " leading kinds 
of activity which constitute human life," he says later : 
" Lastly we have to assert — and the assertion will, we 
doubt not, cause extreme surprise — that the discipline 
of science is superior to that of our ordinary education, 
because of the religious culture that it gives." And again : 
" Devotion to science is tacit worship — a tacit recogni- 
tion of the worth of the things studied ; and by implica- 
tion of their Cause. It is not mere lip-homage, but an 
homage expressed in actions — not a mere professed re- 
spect, but a respect proved by the sacrifice of time, thought 
and labor." 2 

In analyzing social needs, Professor Dewey classifies 
them according to institutions, recognizing the school, 
the state, the home, and the industries. He says: 

We must take the child as a member of society in the broadest 
sense, and demand for and from the schools whatever is necessary 
to enable the child intelligently to recognize all his social relations 
and take his part in sustaining them. . . . 

The child is to be not only a voter and a subject of law ; he is also 
to be a member of a family, himself in turn responsible, in all probabil- 
ity, for rearing and training of future children, thereby maintaining the 
continuity of society. He is to be a worker, engaged in some occu- 
pation which will be of use to society, and which will maintain his 
own independence and self-respect. He is to be a member of some 
particular neighborhood and community, and must contribute to the 

1 See pp. 185-188, 

2 Spencer, Herbert, Education : Intellectual, Moral and Physical, 
1890, pp. 76, 77. 



360 The Principles of Education 

values of life, and to the decencies and graces of civilization wherever 
he is. 1 

In the United States, where religious education is pro- 
vided by the church, religious needs, to which Professor 
Dewey does not specifically refer in this quotation, are 
usually not included among those which the public school 
is to meet. 

If, as Professor Dewey says, " Apart from participation 
in social life, the school has no moral end or aim," 2 which 
is another way of saying that the purpose of the school 
is to make individuals socially efficient, institutions as 
the elements of social life must be the basis for the classi- 
fication of social needs. Social life is life in institutions. 

Social demands are of two kinds, general and special. 
The general demands are those made by all institutions 
upon all individuals ; the special are those made upon only 
various groups of individuals, because of division of labor. 
Social efficiency requires of all persons knowledge and ap- 
preciation of the common duties of the home, the state, 
the industries, the church, and the school ; for no one can 
escape responsibilities belonging to these factors of social 
life. The requirements for all persons in common range 
from turning properly on public thoroughfares to avoid 
collision with other persons, to the sentiment of patriot- 
ism and the recognition of a world purpose. The special 
demands are determined by the particular kind of work 
which, in the division of labor, the individual undertakes. 
Some may be statesmen, clergymen, mechanics, mer- 
chants, or teachers ; others may be housekeepers, artists, 
farmers, doctors, or lawyers. Within each of these and 
other fields of specialization, there is, furthermore, a com- 

1 Dewey, John, Moral Principles in Education, pp. 8-10. 

2 Opus cit., p. 11. 



The Making of the Curriculum 361 

plicated division of labor requiring still more limited 
specialization. 

No absolute distinction exists between these general 
and special demands; one merges into the other. The 
interrelation between them is as complex as the social 
organization itself, so that only the wider differences can 
be recognized. To the extent that the school is respon- 
sible for education, it must, however, define these differ- 
ences as accurately as possible, in order to indicate in the 
curriculum what subject matter should be required of all 
and what subject matter should be open to election by 
special groups. 

As a plan of required and elective work, the curriculum 
may be likened to a map of social life, in so far as the school 
is responsible for education ; for it shows the road over 
which all persons should travel in common and the special 
branch roads which, under the social division of work, 
particular groups may take with advantage. The begin- 
nings of the branch roads are not limited to the end of the 
common road, but appear along the way. For the most 
part, pupils take only a common course until near the end 
of the elementary school work, where such branches of 
specialized study as domestic science and manual arts 
may begin. In the high school and the college, the com- 
mon, road is continued with increasing provision for side- 
excursions in specialization until the professional schools 
are reached, where groups separate into different lines of 
work such as agriculture, civil, mechanical, electrical, and 
chemical engineering, law, medicine, theology, education, 
journalism, and business administration. The college of 
arts and sciences exercises the function of a professional 
school in the case of those who advance beyond a general 
training to specialization for constructive work in the 



362 The Principles of Education 

pure sciences, history, and the fine arts. Social welfare 
requires that, in the division of labor, constructive workers 
be prepared in these fields. Each of these divisions of 
work represented by higher institutions of learning in- 
cludes narrower lines of specialization, which increase in 
number with the growing complexity of social life. 



Ill 

Whatever education institutions other than the school give inci- 
dentally while serving in the best manner the several purposes for 
which they have been established, belongs respectively to these in- 
stitutions, provided that they give this education not less economi- 
cally and effectively than the school can give it ; whatever needed 
education other institutions cannot give under these limitations 
belongs to the school. A rational selection of the school curriculum 
requires a comprehensive application of this principle. 

Since the function of the school is to supplement the 
educational work of other institutions, the next problem 
in the selection of the curriculum is to find what educa- 
tion is given by these other institutions ; for it is necessary 
to subtract this from the total education needed in order 
to find what is left for the school to do. In the home and 
in contact with industrial, political, and religious activities, 
the individual acquires a large part of his education. He 
learns a language, becomes acquainted with many rights 
and duties, assists in various kinds of industrial work, 
buys and sells, observes methods of political government, 
participates in religious activities. Institutions other 
than the school even deliberately promote education, as 
in the case of parental instruction in the home, appren- 
ticeship training in the industries, and Sunday school 
.teaching in the church. This education is, however, 
largely incidental, uneconomical, and varying; but, pari 



The Making of the Curriculum 363 

passu with the rationalized development of the school, 
it tends to become more definitely organized and effective. 
Whether any particular kind of education should be 
left to other institutions or provided by the school curricu- 
lum, does not depend upon capricious changes in other 
institutions, but upon a definite logical principle. The 
fact that the work of the school is supplementary to other 
institutions does not make it subservient to them. It is 
subservient only to the command of the highest social 
welfare, which is the same authority that commands them. 
Since all institutions exist for the sake of promoting the 
highest social welfare, they should cooperate to do this 
in the most efficient way. Each institution, therefore, 
should do with singleness of purpose the special work for 
which it was established in the social order. Whatever 
education other institutions give incidentally while serv- 
ing in the best manner the several purposes for which they 
have been established, belongs respectively to these insti- 
tutions, provided that they give this education not less 
economically and efficiently than the school can give it. 
Whatever education is needed but cannot be given under 
these limitations belongs to the school. When the ap- 
prenticeship system contributed to the most economical 
production of commodities, the education given inciden- 
tally by it belonged to the industries; when, with the 
introduction of machinery and of minute division of labor, 
the apprenticeship system could not be used advan- 
tageously in production, the responsibility for industrial 
education was transferred to the school. When the New 
England town meeting in early colonial days provided for 
civic needs, and, at the same time, without being turned 
aside from this purpose, gave individuals an appreciation 
of the ideals and an understanding of the methods of 



364 The Principles of Education 

government, such training belonged to this political insti- 
tution ; when the government became highly complex and 
representative, so that it could no longer give this educa- 
tion economically, the responsibility of training for the 
duties of citizenship rested upon the school. A rational 
selection of the school curriculum requires a comprehen- 
sive application of this principle. 

IV 

The nature of the pupil's experience must be studied in order to 
determine the successive stages of his development which the cur- 
riculum should mark, and also to determine what electives are best 
suited to prepare him to fill, in the social order, the place for which 
he is best adapted by natural endowment. 

When the requirements for social efficiency have been 
found and those provided for by other institutions have 
been subtracted from them, the remainder define the 
scope of the school ; they reveal what the outcome of school 
education should be, what purposes and means of control 
the pupils must acquire in school in order to take their 
places in social life. A knowledge of the outcome is not, 
however, an adequate guide for the work of the school. 
A map useful for a motor trip to a far-distant city must 
show not only the city and the general direction in which 
it lies ; it must show also the road from town to town on the 
way. The journey from childhood to maturity, for which 
the curriculum serves as a map is a long one, requiring 
even years for its completion, and the byways are innu- 
merable. 

The curriculum, as a map of the road over which the 
pupil should be taken by the school, must show not only 
what social efficiency requires of the adult, but also what 
should be the intermediate stages in the pupil's progress. 



The Making of the Curriculum 365 

These stages depend, in each instance, upon the nature 
of the child's mind. He acquires new purposes when 
strongly appreciated values are transferred from ends to 
means which serve these ends; he acquires new means of 
control from old ones under the guidance of analogy. 1 
If the stages indicated by the curriculum are so far apart 
that these intimate connections necessary for developing 
appreciation and knowledge are not provided, the pupil 
acquires only symbols void of true significance. 

A study of individual pupils not only reveals the con- 
nected stages necessary for the curriculum, but also shows 
which of the branch roads required by the division of 
labor should be included in the curriculum for various 
groups of pupils. Individuals develop best in those lines 
of useful social activity in which they have the strongest 
interests. These feelings of worth, which differ in various 
individuals, primarily on account of differences in natural 
endowment, are the dynamics of life. As Professor 
Hanus says, " Real interest will always be accompanied 
by capacity for a subject, and may usually be recognized 
by persistent, independent, and successful pursuit of a 
subject ; for the pupil's spontaneous activity and achieve- 
ment will always be along the lines of his preferences." 2 
The individual interests should always be balanced 
against the social needs ; those that do not lead to useful 
activity have no authority as guides in selecting the cur- 
riculum. 

1 See Chs. IV and V. 

2 Hanus, Paul H., Educational Aims and Educational Values, p. 8. 



366 The Principles of Education 

V 

In the case of each unit of subject matter available for the curricu- 
lum, we must know (1) the basis of experience necessary for this 
pattern to do its work. (2) the new experience to which this pattern 
leads, and (3) the effectiveness with which it guides from the one 
to the other. 

In addition to finding the social demands for which the 
school should provide in supplementing the education 
received from other institutions, and in addition also to 
finding the nature of the individual experience which the 
school should develop, we must find the nature of each 
pattern, or unit of subject matter, that may be used in 
guiding the pupil to acquire the purposes and means of 
control which lie in the direction of social efficiency. 

A unit of subject matter marks the pathway from one 
stage of experience to another; it has both a terminus a 
quo and a terminus ad quern. In making new purposes, 
the fine arts transfer halos of value from purposes already 
acquired; in making new means of control, the sciences 
lead from the known to the unknown through analogies 
based upon means of control already in the experience of 
the individual. 1 We must know the basis of acquired 
experience necessary for the pattern to do its work, in 
order to find whether it will function in the experience of 
the pupil ; we must know the new experience to which, 
under proper conditions, the pattern leads, in order to 
find its social value ; we must know the effectiveness with 
which it guides from the one to the other, in order to de- 
termine whether it should be preferred to other patterns 
fashioned to do the same work. These three facts we 
must know, because the curriculum should contain only 

1 This is explained in detail in Chs. VIII and IX. 



The Making of the Curriculum 367 

those units of subject matter which, from stage to stage 
of the pupil's development, are the best guides to the 
highest social efficiency. 



VI 

Some thinkers have made the mistake of attempting to select the 
curriculum with reference only to the nature of the pupil or with 
reference only to the subject matter, neither of which is a reliable 
guide in itself. In such cases, the choice is really made under 
the guidance of prejudice, which masquerades in the clothes of child 
nature or of subject matter and thereby escapes the critical ex- 
amination necessary to purge it of error. 

The analysis given above reveals two factors controlled 
by the school in developing those forms of social efficiency 
for which other institutions make it responsible. They 
are the nature of the pupil and subject matter. The 
former is the " material " with which the school must work 
and the latter consists of patterns which may be used in 
refashioning this material. In the selection of the cur- 
riculum, these factors have no final significance or value 
in themselves, but derive significance and value from the 
aim which the school seeks to realize. 

Some thinkers have, however, made the mistake of 
attempting to select the curriculum with reference only to 
the nature of the child or with reference only to subject 
matter. They have believed falsely that their selection 
depended only upon one or the other of these, when, in 
reality, it depended upon the insidious influence of tradi- 
tion. Traditional prejudices intimately associated with 
the nature of the child or with the subject matter seem in 
time to be inherent characteristics of these despite the 
fact that they are foreign. When traditional prejudices 
become thus disguised as inherent characteristics of child 



368 The Principles of Education 

nature or of subject matter, their authority is not ques- 
tioned, but blindly accepted. Tradition not purged of 
error by critical examination is liable to be misleading. 

Of those who look to the nature of the child for guid- 
ance, some confine attention to the child's interests and 
others confine attention to formal aspects of his mind, 
which are known as " faculties." The first group is rep- 
resented by Rousseau, who believed that just as appetite 
guides to what one should eat, so interest guides to what 
one should study. The second group consists of those 
who believe that the child's mind is composed of " facul- 
ties " such as observation, memory, and reason, and that 
any subject matter which exercises these faculties, irre- 
spective of its particular content, is valuable in developing 
them. These views have been criticized in the discussion 
of individual development and of the harmonious develop- 
ment of all the powers of the individual, as aims of educa- 
tion. 1 It is necessary to repeat here only the fact that the 
child may be interested in evil as well as in good, and the 
fact that his mind is not composed of " faculties." Moral 
literature is not chosen for the curriculum because it is 
more interesting -than immoral literature ; arithmetic and 
grammar are not chosen because they better train the 
" faculties " than do mechanical puzzles and card games. 
These truths would be clearly apparent if bias in favor 
of moral literature did not masquerade in the clothes of 
interest, and bias in favor of arithmetic and grammar did 
not masquerade in the clothes of formal training. 

Those who look to the nature of subject matter for 

guidance in selecting the curriculum are inclined to 

regard knowledge and appreciation as ends in themselves. 

They seek a basis for preference in the structure rather 

1 Pp. 328-330. 



The Making of the Curriculum 369 

than in the function of subject matter ; or, in other words, 
in formal aspects of the subject matter rather than in its 
usefulness for social action. Specific instances of this 
view will make clear the fact that, in selecting the curric- 
ulum, guidance apparently found in subject matter is 
really due to the insidious influence of a traditional bias 
that is so intimately associated with the subject matter 
as to appear to be an essential characteristic of it. 

One of the oldest instances of this view is found in 
Plato's Republic. In the first half of the Republic, Plato 
selects subject matter with reference to social action. He 
eliminates from the traditional elementary curriculum of 
his time the subject matter that would develop ideals con- 
flicting with the highest welfare of the state. Near the 
middle of the Republic, however, he transfers emphasis 
from social action to subject matter. In selecting the cur- 
riculum for higher education, Plato stresses the value of 
knowledge for its own sake. His choice of subject matter 
is based here upon its degree of abstractness, the more 
abstract subject matter appearing to him to represent 
knowledge of higher worth. This leads him to regard pure 
mathematics and dialectic as of the highest importance. 
Abstraction is not in itself a synonym for worth, but ap- 
peared so to him, because he had acquired a bias in favor 
of philosophic thought, which is deductive in form and 
abstract in nature. Not the inherent characteristics of 
subject matter itself but a bias due to tradition led him, 
therefore, to regard pure mathematics and dialectic as 
the subject matter of most worth. 

A modern example of the dependence upon character- 
istics of subject matter for guidance in selecting the 
curriculum is found in Harris's Psychologic Foundations 
of Education. Harris accepts all subject matter which 



370 The Principles of Education 

tradition has marked as appropriate for the school. This 
subject matter is so comprehensive that any one student 
can acquire only a small part of it. He attempts to over- 
come this difficulty by dividing subject matter on the 
basis of its own characteristics into five coordinate groups, 
and by advising that the curriculum for each pupil should 
include at all times some subject matter representative of 
each group. He says : 

The studies of the school fall naturally into these five coordinate 
groups: first, mathematics and physics; second, biology, including 
chiefly the plant and the animal ; third, literature and art, including 
chiefly the study of literary works of art ; fourth, grammar and the 
technical and scientific study of language, leading to such branches 
as logic and psychology ; fifth, history and the study of sociological, 
political, and social institutions. Each one of these groups should 
be represented in the curriculum of the schools at all times by some 
topic suited to the age and previous training of the pupil. 1 

A similar method of selecting studies is often used in sec- 
ondary and higher schools before the period of specializa- 
tion begins. The student is required to do some work 
in each of a variety of fields, so that his experience may 
be broadened and, at the same time, opportunity may be 
given him to find the line of specialization best suited to 
his interests. 

The method used by Harris abandons the selection to 
the preferences which tradition has intimately associated 
with the various forms of subject matter. The studies 
which tradition has marked as appropriate for education 
are accepted bodily without critical review. When they 
have been divided into groups according to formal differ- 
ences, the requirement that merely some studies from each 
group be pursued abandons selection again to traditional 

1 Harris, W. T., Psychologic Foundations of Education, p. 323. 



The Making of the Curriculum 371 

bias. There is no guidance for choice within the groups, 
except that the " topic " should be " suited to the age and 
previous training of the pupil." This provision is only 
another way of saying that the pupil should not study 
topics which he cannot understand or appreciate. But 
the vast number of topics he can understand or appre- 
ciate, are left on the same level of importance until bias 
due to tradition steps in to determine the choice. Harris 
merely simplifies the exercise of this bias by placing before 
it at the same time for its judgment only one fifth of the 
topics which the pupil can understand or appreciate in 
the whole field of traditional learning. The fundamental 
error of this method becomes apparent as soon as the 
facts are recognized that the primary function of the 
school is not to teach subject matter, but to prepare for 
social action, and that subject matter should, therefore, 
be selected with reference to the social action which it 
serves. 

VII 

The principles presented in this chapter for selecting the curriculum 
provide for (1) genuine interest in subject matter, (2) normal 
effort, (3) effective drill, (4) the significant organization of experi- 
ence, (5) the true differentiation of required and elective work, 
(6) the highest practical efficiency, (7) the richest culture, (8) the 
most profitable use of the time devoted to school work by pupils 
who leave school before having completed the curriculum, (9) the 
preparation for both life and higher education by the same work, 

(10) the best standards for selecting the more efficient pupils, 

(11) the simplification of the curriculum, and (12) the elimination 
of breaks between schools of different rank in the educational 
hierarchy. 

The simplest way to obviate the faults of the traditional 
curricula is to select and organize studies in accordance 
with the principles that have been presented in this 



372 The Principles of Education 

chapter. When attempts are made to remedy these faults 
directly, there is danger of treating mere symptoms 
instead of the real difficulties. Such instances of the 
treating of mere symptoms are found in the attempt to 
make ill-selected subject matter interesting by " sugar 
coating," and in the attempt to compel the pupil for the 
sake of discipline to study useless problems. In such 
cases, the principles presented in this chapter point 
clearly to the seat of the difficulty and indicate what 
remedy is needed. 

How some of the more conspicuous faults of the tradi- 
tional curricula are obviated by selecting subject matter 
in accordance with the principles presented in this chapter 
will now be considered. , Such selection provides for (1) gen- 
uine interest in subject matter, (2) normal effort, (3) effect- 
ive drill, (4) the significant organization of experience, 

(5) the true differentiation of required and elective work, 

(6) the highest practical efficiency, (7) the richest culture, 
(8) the most profitable use of time devoted to school work 
by pupils who leave school before having completed the 
curriculum, (9) the preparation both for life and for 
higher education by the same work, (10) the best stand- 
ards for selecting the more efficient pupils, (11) the sim- 
plification of the curriculum, and (12) the elimination of 
breaks between the schools of different rank in the educa- 
tional hierarchy. The absence of these characteristics 
marks some of the most conspicuous faults of the tradi- 
tional curricula. Let us now see how these character- 
istics are provided when the curriculum is selected in ac- 
cordance with the principles presented in this chapter. 

(1) The curriculum is genuinely interesting to the pupil. 
The principle that the social patterns forming the cur- 
riculum should be fitted to the immature experience of 



The Making of the Curriculum 373 

the pupil requires that the ideal-giving subject matter 
appeal to purposes he already strongly appreciates and 
that control-giving subject matter overcome difficulties 
which lie in the way of ends he desires to realize. School 
life is thus normal living for the pupil. The application 
of this principle insures interest, because interest is an 
essential characteristic of purpose, and is carried over to 
the means of control which serve in realizing the purpose. 
The principle that new purposes and means of control 
when developed should promote social efficiency requires 
that the interest be genuine. Spurious, or extrinsic, 
interests, including those which result from "sugar- 
coated " subject matter, accompany the development of 
purposes and means of control that are abnormal and, 
therefore, ineffectual guides for action. 1 

(2) The curriculum secures normal effort; it neither 
justifies the stigma of " soft pedagogics " by indulging 
undisciplined interests, nor includes tasks that have no 
significance. It provides the subject matter necessary to 
develop such ideals as duty, diligence, industry, and per- 
sistence, which are necessary to overcome sporadic in- 
terests that cause effort by interfering with useful study. 
Only those conditions of effort to which the individual is 
subjected in the valuable activities of the wider social life 
are necessary in education. This fact precludes tasks 
that are mere tasks, because the effort involved in them 
has no valuable significance, and is, therefore, superfluous 
and abnormal. 

(3) Adequate provision is made for effective drill. 
Social efficiency requires that the pupil fix in memory such 
things as the multiplication table and spelling. Since 
the curriculum should be adapted to successive stages in the 

1 See pp. 133-137. 



374 The Principles of Education 

child's developing experience, this drill does not take place 
until other subject matter has developed the pupil's experi- 
ence to a stage where he feels the need for it. Drill is a 
means of control which, like any other means of control, is 
normally acquired and used in the service of some purpose 
that gives it true significance. The pupil must first recog- 
nize that desired ends which arithmetic problems normally 
serve can be attained more accurately and easily by fixing 
the multiplication table in his memory than by using 
addition or consulting printed tables ; he must first recog- 
nize that writing which he desires to do can be controlled 
more easily by memorizing spelling than by continually 
consulting a dictionary or calling upon others for assist- 
ance. The problem in these cases is to find the best means 
for fixing in memory the multiplication table and spelling. 
When the pupil has, under social guidance, found the best 
method of memorizing, the next step is to use it. Drill is 
abnormal unless the pupil is thus actuated by a purpose 
which gives true and valuable significance to it. 

(4) The organization of subject matter is adapted to the 
pupil's stage of development. " Logically " organized 
subject matter is introduced only when the pupil feels 
the need for it. This need arises when the means of con- 
trol acquired by the pupil become so manifold that he can 
use them more effectively when they are organized in 
groups according to similarities in their natures. The 
pupil first acquires facts in the interest of such concrete 
purposes as making or extinguishing a fire, growing plants 
in his garden, ventilating a room, repairing a door-bell, 
speaking and writing intelligibly. These purposes not 
only give meanings to the facts, but also serve as the bases 
for organizing them, so long as the facts do not become too 
manifold. At .this stage of his development, the pupil 



The Making of the Curriculum 375 

cannot grasp the true significance of subject matter organ- 
ized according to the logic of science, because he neither 
appreciates the purpose nor understands the method of 
science. Under the guidance of such subject matter, he 
fails to acquire for facts even those practical meanings and 
useful organizations suited to his immature experience. 
The subject matter appears to him, therefore, to consist 
of only vaguely significant and arbitrarily classified facts 
that should be committed to memory. This fault does 
not exist when the curriculum is adapted to the stage of 
development attained by the pupil, because, when the cur- 
riculum is so adapted, the subject matter is not logically 
organized until the pupil feels the need for such organiza- 
tion and understands its significance. 

(5) The curriculum makes a true distinction between the 
required and the elective courses, serving social efficiency 
with due provision for individual differences. The re- 
quired subject matter is that needed by people in general 
for participation in the various institutions ; the elective 
subject matter is that needed by various classes of indi- 
viduals for special lines of activity differentiated in the 
social division of labor. The election of subject matter 
which promotes efficiency in these special lines of activity, 
depends upon the dominant interests of the individual 
concerned. As Professor Hanus says : " Real interest 
will always be accompanied by capacity for a subject, and 
may usually be recognized by persistent, independent, and 
successful pursuit of a subject ; for the pupil's spontaneous 
activity and achievement will always be along the lines 
of his preferences. Independent pursuit does not mean 
without the teacher's guidance, but it does mean without 
the teacher's constant urging or assistance." 1 Abundant 

1 Hanus, Paul H., Educational Aims and Educational Values, p. 8. 



376 The Principles of Education 

opportunity for awakening these interests is provided in 
the diversified training of required subject matter, which 
gives the basis for specialization. 

(6) The curriculum provides for the highest practical 
efficiency rather than for mere " book learning.' ' Subject 
matter is normally a guide for action, not an end in itself. 
" Bookishness " means that the pupil does not receive the 
guidance for which the subject matter is intended, but 
merely retains in memory and repeats on occasion words 
that are useless to him, because the purposes and means 
of control they symbolize have not been truly developed 
in his experience. 

(7) The curriculum provides for the richest culture. 
The value of experience depends upon its practical conse- 
quences. Ideals and ideas that guide best the complex 
activities of social life constitute the richest culture for 
which the curriculum can provide. When the individual 
has acquired appreciation of the higher and more remote 
purposes that give halos to even the common activities of 
life, when he has acquired the true meanings of activities 
by relating them to these purposes, the world built in his 
experience includes the richest values and the deepest 
meanings.. This culture is very different from the cul- 
ture, falsely so called, which is born of sentimentality and 
snobbery, and which has no use save as a traditional 
badge of distinction. 

(8) Pupils who leave school before having completed 
the curriculum, as well as those who do complete it, make 
the most profitable use of the time they devote to school work. 
This is true because the subject matter for each stage of 
the pupil's development is selected with reference to the 
most important social demands upon him. Because of 
the fact thai many pupils withdraw after only a few years 



The Making of the Curriculum 377 

of school work, this characteristic of the curriculum is of 
great importance. 

(9) The curriculum makes no essential difference be- 
tween preparing for higher education and preparing for life. 
The lower and the higher education serve the same end and 
differ only because they guide the experience of the indi- 
vidual at different stages in his development. To the 
extent that the college forces upon the secondary school 
subject matter significant only as preparatory for the work 
of a higher institution of learning, the college defeats its 
own purpose. If the pupil does not understand and appre- 
ciate the vital significance of his school work, he acquires 
abnormal meanings and appreciations of value, which 
make an inadequate basis for the higher training of the 
college. It is better that the candidate for admission to 
college come with a strong initiative and a wholesome 
understanding of the simpler practical affairs of life. 

(10) The curriculum makes it possible for the school to 
exercise properly its important function of selecting the more 
efficient pupils for its stamp of approval. Under present 
conditions, the pupils whom the school most honors are 
not necessarily those most capable of attaining the highest 
success beyond the school. This is the case when the cur- 
riculum fails to give the guidance intended because it 
does not fit the experience of the pupil, or when a large 
part of the subject matter is of comparatively little prac- 
tical value. Tests used to measure the abilities of pupils 
often do not reveal these faults of the traditional curric- 
ulum, because they measure only the ability to memo- 
rize more or less significant symbols. The only reliable 
evidence of the possession of ideals and ideas is found in 
the control they exercise over the pupil's activities. 

(11) The curriculum is not overcrowded with subject 



378 The Principles of Education 

matter. The chief causes of an overcrowded curriculum 
are (a) the retention of comparatively useless subject 
matter through force of custom, and (6) the use of logi- 
cal classifications that are not psychological for the pupil. 
(a) In the selection of the traditional curriculum there 
has been a strong tendency, we have learned, merely to 
add, from time to time, subject matter necessary to 
meet new social situations, without eliminating that 
which has become obsolete. The principles presented in 
this chapter provide for eliminating subject matter that 
no longer serves social needs. (6) Logical classification 
has tended to divide the curriculum into more or less 
isolated parts in the lower stages of school work. It has, 
for example, led pupils to acquire the " tools " of knowl- 
edge — reading, writing, and arithmetic — in isolation 
by means of otherwise useless " exercises " invented 
especially for this purpose. If these " tools " are acquired 
in the service of intrinsically worthful subject matter, 
such as literature, history, nature study, and geography, 
the intrinsically useless " exercises " drop out and the 
subject matter through correlation is thus simplified. 
Logical organization in the lower stages of school work 
not only tends to isolate various fields of subject matter, 
but also sets up within these fields classifications that are 
an encumbrance, because they have no significance for the 
pupil, and that carry with them ideas selected for the 
sake of logical interest rather than of practical utility. 
In the early stages of grammatical study, the pupil finds 
principles organized logically with relation one to another, 
although he normally feels the need of relating them 
only to his language. He finds also the finer distinctions 
of mood which are called for by logical analysis, but which 
satisfy no felt need at his stage of development. The 



The Making of the Curriculum 379 

fact that the curriculum should fit the experience of the 
pupil requires the introduction of logical classifications 
only when the pupil has reached an advanced stage of 
experience in which he has need of them. This require- 
ment means close correlation throughout the curriculum 
and the elimination of logical distinctions that are not 
vital to the pupil, both of which tend to prevent the cur- 
riculum from being overcrowded with subject matter. 

(12) There are no breaks between the work of schools of 
different rank in the educational hierarchy. Different his- 
torical origins of elementary schools, secondary schools, 
and universities, are responsible for breaks between the 
work of these classes of schools. Democracy has not 
completely united these institutions into one system. 
Since there are no breaks in the development of the indi- 
vidual, institutions of different rank should present a 
continuous curriculum. The parts of the curriculum 
which tradition has assigned to schools of different rank 
should, indeed, be subject to change, from time to time, 
in the interest of a more efficient educational system, in 
which a convenient and economical distribution of schools 
is an important consideration. The recent development 
of junior high schools and junior colleges is an example of 
such changes. 



380 The Principles of Education 



VIII 

The problems which must be solved in selecting the curriculum 
from the materialistic point of view are : (1) What reactions are 
necessary for cooperation in each of the systems of group habits? 
(2) What reactions do systems of group habits other than the school 
develop in immature organisms not less effectively than the school 
can develop them ? (3) What is the nature of the native and of the 
acquired reactions of the immature organism ? (4) What is the 
nature of each type of environment available to cause the develop- 
ment of the immature organism's reactions? These correspond 
to the four problems given in teleological terms at the beginning 
of this chapter. Natural science supports the conclusions we have 
reached with regard to (1) the final test of the accuracy with 
which the curriculum has been selected, (2) the mistaken ideas 
of the basis upon which the selection should be made, and (3) the 
valuable characteristics of the curriculum selected in accordance 
with the principles presented in this chapter. 

Does the materialistic explanation of the principles 
underlying the making of the curriculum support the 
statement we have made of these principles from the 
teleological point of view? 

In the terms of natural science, the function of the 
school is to supplement the influence of group habits, 
otherwise known as institutions, in modifying the reac- 
tions of immature organisms in such manner that these 
organisms react more effectively with others in coopera- 
tive adjustment to environment. In order to select, 
under the guidance of this truth, the types of reactions 
which the curriculum should provide, we must answer 
each of the following questions : (1) What reactions are 
necessary for cooperation in each of the systems of group 
habits ? In teleological terms, this means that we must 
find what purposes and what means of control are needed 
for efficient participation in the life of each social insti- 
tution. (2) What reactions do systems of group habits 



The Making of the Curriculum 381 

other than the school develop in the immature organism 
not less effectively than the school can develop them? 
This means teleologically that we must find what edu- 
cation is given by institutions other than the school. 
(3) What is the nature of the native and of the acquired 
reactions of the immature organism? It is necessary to 
know this because new reactions are made through the 
modification of old ones, and also because different organ- 
isms are adapted by nature to play different parts in 
group adjustment. This means teleologically that we 
must find what is the nature of the pupil's native and 
acquired purposes and means of control so that we can 
select subject matter that is adapted to them. (4) What 
is the nature of each type of environment available to 
cause the development of the immature organism's reac- 
tions? The answer to this question requires an inves- 
tigation of the basis of native and acquired reactions 
which each type of environment is suited to modify, the 
new reaction which it develops through this modification, 
and its comparative effectiveness in developing this new 
reaction. This means teleologically that we must know 
with reference to each available unit of subject matter 
the purposes and means of control which its normal 
functioning requires as a basis^ the new purposes or means 
of control to which it leads, and the comparative economy 
and effectiveness with which it leads from the one to the 
other. 

In the light of the answers to these questions, we can 
begin with the immature equipment of reactions with 
which the child comes to school, allow for those which 
other group habits develop in the child, and then find 
what types of environment will most economically and 
effectively cause it to acquire, from stage to stage of its 



382 The Principles of Education 

development, forms of response necessary for effective 
cooperation in group adjustment. This is the natural 
science way of saying that we can begin with the immature 
equipment of purposes and means of control with which 
the child comes to school, allow for those which other 
institutions normally give him, and then find what subject 
matter will best guide him, from stage to stage of his 
development, in acquiring the purposes and means of con- 
trol necessary for efficient participation in the institutions 
which make up social life. 

Provided the methods of teaching are not at fault, the 
final test of the accuracy with which the curriculum has 
been made is found, according to natural science, in the 
effectiveness with which the reactions developed under 
the influence of the curriculum promote the cooperative 
adjustment of human organisms to the environment. 
This fact means that, provided the methods of teaching 
are not at fault, the final test of the accuracy with which 
the curriculum has been made is found in the social 
efficiency of those who have been educated under its 
guidance. 

Natural science shows convincingly that it is a mistake 
to depend upon either the nature of the child alone or 
upon the nature of the subject matter alone as a guide 
for making the curriculum. The development of the 
immature organism, on the one hand, depends upon an 
inheritance of acquired characteristics transmitted during 
infancy through interaction with the group. The instinc- 
tive tendencies with which the organism is endowed by 
nature may be the basis of acquiring all sorts of reac- 
tions, many of which are useless. The reactions which, 
transmitted by the group, constitute the development 
of the immature organism, are selected as the result Of 



The Making of the Curriculum 383 

their effectiveness in adjustment through a long process of 
group activity ; their usefulness is revealed primarily not 
by the tendencies of the immature organism, but by the 
achievements of the mature organisms of the group. 
Subject matter, on the other hand, corresponds to types 
of environment which induce certain forms of reaction. 
The usefulness of these types of environment is obviously 
not revealed by a study of their structure exclusively, 
but by an investigation of the effectiveness with which the 
reactions developed under their influence adjust the organ- 
ism to its environment as it cooperates with the group. 

In showing from the materialistic point of view that the 
curriculum made with reference to the principles pre- 
sented in this chapter has valuable characteristics, such 
as providing for genuine interest, normal effort, effective 
drill, and the significant organization of experience, it is 
necessary only to mention the equivalents of these in 
terms of natural science. (1) The curriculum is genuinely 
interesting, because, by being suited to the nature of the 
child, it calls forth and modifies strong instincts and 
habits, and thus reduces to a minimum conflicting re- 
sponses, the parallel of the feeling of effort, which are accen- 
tuated when the selected environment of the school does not 
fit the nature of the child. (2) It secures normal effort, 
because the types of environment it provides for the 
school correspond to the normal environment outside the 
school. Whatever conflicts of responses occur under such 
conditions are conflicts which must be overcome before 
the organism can be adapted to the wider environment 
beyond the school. There are no mere school situations 
devised to avoid conflicts on the one hand, or to induce 
them on the other. (3) Adequate provision is made for 
effective drill, which is called forth only when it must be- 



384 The Principles of Education 

come a part of some reaction for the successful comple- 
tion of the adjustment in which the reaction is checked. 
An adjustment which requires rapid counting may be 
blocked until drill on the multiplication table modifies 
the reaction in such manner that it overcomes the obstruc- 
tion. (4) The organization of subject matter is adapted 
to the pupil's stage of development, because the curric- 
ulum provides for the organization of responses only to 
the extent that this modifies his reactions in such manner 
as to make adjustment more effective. (5) The true 
basis for the distinction between the required and the 
elective courses in the curriculum is found in the difference 
between reactions which best promote group adjustment 
when acquired by all organisms in common and those 
which best promote group adjustment when divided 
among various classes of organisms that are equipped by 
nature so that they acquire more economically and effect- 
ively one or another of these special kinds of reaction. 
(6) The fact that the curriculum provides for the best 
adjustment to environment means that it provides for 
the highest practical efficiency. Mere " book learning " 
is a parallel of changes which books make in the central 
nervous system and which do not find expression in 
definite and useful forms of adjustment. (7) Since 
culture is the parallel of the development of the nervous 
system through the acquiring of new reactions, the richest 
culture is provided for, because the richest development 
of the nervous system is that which leads to the best ad- 
justment to environment. (8) Those who leave school 
before completing the curriculum, as well as those who do 
complete it, make the most profitable use of the time they 
devote to school work, because the curriculum develops the 
most useful adjustments in the order in which they can be 



The Making of the Curriculum 385 

acquired most economically. (9) The fact that each 
new reaction acquired under the influence of the curric- 
ulum both gives a better immediate adjustment and 
serves as a basis for acquiring still further forms of adjust- 
ment, marks as artificial the distinction between prepara- 
tion for college and preparation for life. (10) The curric- 
ulum makes it possible for the school to exercise properly 
its function of selecting the more efficient pupils, since 
this selection can be made only upon the basis of acquired 
reactions that are effective in adjustment. (11)' The 
curriculum is simplified through the elimination of situa- 
tions which call forth reactions that do not directly pro- 
mote better adjustment in the world beyond the school. 
This elimination prevents the overcrowded condition 
found in the traditional curriculum. (12) There are no 
breaks between the work of the schools of different rank 
in the educational hierarchy, because there are no breaks 
in the development of the nervous system, in which new 
reactions are developed through modification of those 
already acquired. 

REFERENCES 

Munsterberg, H., Psychology and the Teacher, 1910, pp. 253-270. 
(Discusses the fundamental considerations valuable in the selec- 
tion of the curriculum.) 

Betts, G. H., Social Principles of Education, 1913, pp. 231-290. 
(Gives a general discussion of the nature and function of the 
curriculum.) 

MacVannel, J. A., Outline of a Course in the Philosophy of Education, 
1912, pp. 185-193. (Gives a condensed statement of the prob- 
lems of the curriculum and of the bases for the selection of school 
studies.) 

Dewey, J., Moral Principles in Education, 1909, pp. 31-44. (Dis- 
cusses the social nature of the curriculum.) 



386 The Principles of Education 

Ruediger, W. C, The Principles of Education, 1910, pp. 167-185. 
(Gives a general discussion of the nature of the curriculum and 
of the criteria for selecting it.) 

Raymont, T.,The Principles of Education, 1904, pp. 89-118. (Criti- 
cizes the idea of formal discipline as a basis for selecting the cur- 
riculum, and holds that a rationally conceived curriculum must 
be the resultant of the nature of the child and of the require- 
ments of the community.) 

Klapper, P., Principles of Educational Practice, 1912, pp. 91-150. 
(Discusses the relation between the child and the curriculum, 
and the social organization and content of the curriculum.) 

Charters, W. W., Methods of Teaching, 1912, pp. 107-117. (Dis- 
cusses with reference to the high school course of study the factors 
in the selection of subject matter and the details of the selection, 
and gives a tentative list of required subjects.) 

Hanus, P., Educational Aims and Educational Values, 1908, pp. 3-20. 
(Discusses the relative values of subject matter. Compare the 
terms "purposes" and "means of control" with the terms "in- 
centives " and " power " used in this reference.) 

Spencer, H., Education; Intellectual, Moral and Physical, 1890, Ch. I. 
(Gives a brief in support of science as the knowledge of most 
worth.) 

Moore, E. C, What is Education? 1915, pp. 59-103. (Criticizes the 
doctrine of general discipline.) 

Bagley, W. C, The Educative Process, 1907, pp. 203-217. (Discusses 
the doctrine of formal discipline.) 

Strayer, G. D., A Brief Course in the Teaching Process, 1911, pp. 232- 
246. (Discusses the relation of the teacher to the course of 
study.) 

Dewey, J., The Child and the Curriculum, 1902, pp. 7-10. (Discusses 
the relation between the child and the curriculum.) 

PROBLEMS 

1. Sometimes boys who make low records in their school work 
become very successful members of society after they have left 
school. How would you explain this fact? 

2. A prominent educator has said: "I am profoundly convinced 



The Making of the Curriculum 387 

that the greatest educational need of our time, in higher and lower 
schools alike, is a fuller appreciation on the part of the teachers of 
what human institutions really mean and what tremendous moral 
issues and principles they involve." Do you agree with this state- 
ment? Give reasons for your agreement or disagreement. 

3. What is the function in a democracy of each of the following: 
the elementary school, the secondary school, the junior high school, 
the senior high school, the normal school, the junior college, the 
college, the university? 

4. What serious tendency to error should be guarded against in the 
making of secondary school curricula with a view especially to voca- 
tional training? 

5. What changes do you wish had been made in the curriculum 
you pursued in the elementary school ? In the secondary school ? 

6. In the secondary school you attended, point out some of the 
recent changes that have been made to meet new social conditions. 

7. In the secondary school you attended, what should have been 
the required subjects and what should have been the elective sub- 
jects? Why? 

8. What should be taken into consideration in determining col- 
lege entrance requirements? 

9. a. What is the chief cause of the break students often find in 
their educational 'experience when they go from a secondary school 
to a college ? 6. Is this a fault in our educational system ? Explain. 

10. What are some of the more important requirements of the 
work of a teacher for which the curriculum of a professional school 
for the training of teachers should make provision? 



CHAPTER XIII 

THE PRINCIPLES UNDERLYING THE 
METHODS OF TEACHING 

The function of teaching is to supplement the guiding influence 
of the subject matter included in the curriculum. There are 
two general types of teaching, — that which guides the pupil 
in acquiring new purposes and that which guides him in acquir- 
ing new means of control. The teacher should know the steps 
in each type of teaching in order to find exactly what assistance 
is needed when the pupil meets some difficulty in learning. 
In the teaching of purpose-giving subject matter, the steps are 
to make the pupil (1) feel the value of some purpose, (2) asso- 
ciate with this purpose a means for realizing it, and (3) use the 
means either actually or imaginatively in attaining the purpose. 
In the teaching of control subject matter, the steps are to make 
the pupil (1) try to attain some purpose in the realizing of which 
he meets a difficulty that can be overcome by the new means of 
control about to be presented, (2) locate the difficulty by making 
and testing hypotheses, (3) solve in a similar way the problem 
arising from this difficulty, and (4) use the solution in attaining 
his original purpose. Important perversions of the methods of 
teaching are (1) the use of extrinsic motivation, (2) "telling," 
(3) the over-emphasis of memory work, and (4) the confusion of 
appreciation and control lessons. 



Teaching is required in order to give the detailed guidance neces- 
sary for effectively connecting the subject matter of the curriculum 
with the experience of the pupil. There are two types of teach- 
ing, — that which guides the pupil in acquiring new purposes and 
that which guides him in acquiring new means of control. The 
teacher should know the steps in each type of teaching in order 
to find exactly what assistance is needed when the pupil meets 
some difficulty in learning. 

388 



The Methods of Teaching 389 

The function of teaching is to supplement the guiding 
influence of the subject matter included in the curriculum. 
Pupils who may be regarded as in practically the same 
stage of development vary greatly in the appreciation 
and the knowledge upon which new purposes and new 
means of control can be based; they vary greatly also 
in their susceptibility to guidance. The subject matter 
included in the curriculum Cannot provide for all these 
individual differences. Indeed, until the individual is 
actually engaged in studying the subject matter, the de- 
tails of the assistance which he needs may not be known. 
Teaching is required, consequently, to give the detailed 
guidance necessary for effectively connecting the subject 
matter of the curriculum with the experience of the pupil. 
The greater the misfit between the subject matter included 
in the curriculum and the experience of the pupil, the 
more is the work of the teacher necessary. 

Since teaching is " causing the pupil to learn," and 
since this can be done only by making the methods of 
teaching conform to the process through which the pupil 
acquires (1) new purposes and (2) new means of control, 
there must be two general types of teaching. Writers on 
methods of teaching have differentiated a number of types 
of lessons, such as inductive, deductive, study, drill, 
review, recitation, lecture, and appreciation lessons. 1 All 
of these may, however, be classified under the two main 
types mentioned ; their functions are to give either new 
purposes or better control. The appreciation lesson is to 
give a new appreciation of value, or, in other words, a 
new purpose ; the inductive, deductive, and drill lessons 
are primarily to give better control; the study, review, 

1 See Strayer, G. D., A Brief Course in the Teaching Process, pp. 
41-112. 



390 The Principles of Education 

recitation, and lecture lessons may belong to either class, 
according to the function of the subject matter used. In 
each of these cases, the attention of the pupil is centered 
upon defining and solving problems or upon intimately 
associating some means with a strongly appreciated end 
so that the means receives value from its intimate asso- 
ciation with the end. 

The subdivision of the two main classes of lessons into 
various types is useful, since it shows the different kinds of 
situations in which the principles for teaching apprecia- 
tion or the principles for teaching control may be used. 
In the inductive lesson the pupil acquires a general idea 
for control on the basis of particulars ; in the deductive 
lesson he discovers how to apply a general idea to the 
control of some particular situation ; in the drill lesson he 
attains skill in some activity ; in the review lesson he learns 
more effectually, usually through better organization, 
subject matter with which he has some familiarity ; in the 
recitation lesson he gains appreciation or control through 
class instruction; and in the study lesson he acquires 
better appreciation or control through private study. 

A knowledge of the steps through which the pupil 
acquires new purposes and new means of control is useful 
to the teacher in determining the exact difficulty when 
the learning process does not proceed effectively. It is 
not necessary that the teacher emphasize each of these 
steps. Indeed, so long as the pupil learns economically 
by himself the teacher is not needed. When, however, the 
pupil does need assistance, the teacher should know the 
steps in the process of learning so that he can put his 
finger on the difficulty and know what to do in order to 
overcome it. An analogy may be found in the running 
of an automobile. So long as the mechanism of the 



The Methods of Teaching 391 

automobile runs effectively, no interference with it is 
necessary ; but if the mechanism does not run effectively, 
one must understand the steps in the transmission of 
power from the gasoline tank to the wheels in order to 
locate and to overcome the difficulty. 

II 

In the teaching of history, which is purpose-giving subject matter, 
the steps are to make the pupil (1) appreciate the purpose which 
induced people of the past to devise the institutional practice he is 
studying historically, (2) associate with this purpose the practice as 
a means devised for attaining it, and (3) accept in imagination the 
practice as serving the purpose. 

Let us now consider the teaching of history in the light 
of the steps through which an individual acquires new 
purposes. These steps, as we have learned, are (1) a 
feeling of the value of some purpose, (2) the associating 
with this purpose of some means for its realization, and 
(3) the use of this means in realizing the purpose. 1 

(1) The purposes which the pupil should appreciate 
in the study of history are those that led people in the 
past to devise the various institutional practices into 
which history gives an insight. There must, of course, 
be some purpose which leads the pupil to turn from his 
present activity, whatever it may be, to the study of his- 
tory. This may be a desire to get a better appreciation of 
a specific practice or of a system of practices in govern- 
ment, religion, education, or some other human activity. 
It may be a desire to enjoy an hour of reading or to fulfill 
some requirement in professional training. The motive 
mentioned first is the best, because it leads the pupil to 
understand the true function of his study. These motives, 

1 See Ch. IV. 



392 The Principles of Education 

however, are soon combined with a sympathetic apprecia- 
tion of the aims that guided the activities of the men 
whose history he is studying. If history is uninteresting 
to the pupil when it is neither too elementary nor too 
advanced for him, the subject matter is either badly 
written or poorly taught. It should enable him to relive 
the most exciting events in the drama of life, events which 
have involved important changes in social practices and 
which for that reason must have been accompanied by 
strong purposes and anxious thought. When the pupil 
stands with the embattled New England farmers in their 
struggle for democracy, he may forget that he began this 
study in order to acquire a truer appreciation of present 
democratic practices. If his appreciation of those pur- 
poses which guided the development of our political 
practices is strong enough to drive the present from his 
consciousness, we can rest assured that when he has 
traced the historical movements up to the present, the 
activities of to-day will return to his consciousness enriched 
by the significance and the value with which these older 
purposes have endowed them. 

The fact that the best motive for studying history is 
to get a better appreciative understanding of present 
practices does not mean that the course of history should 
be traced backwards from present practices. This pro- 
cedure would be as abnormal as that of reading a story or 
a drama backwards. Later purposes and problems get 
their value and meaning from those which have gone 
before just as truly in the case of society as in the case of 
an individual. 

Although the motive which has led the pupil to open 
his book of history may linger in the background to 
strengthen and guide his interest in the subject matter, 



The Methods of Teaching 393 

the first step peculiar to the teaching of history is that of 
leading the pupil to appreciate the purpose which has 
called forth a new social practice. If the study of classical 
Latin at the time of the Italian Renaissance is the new 
practice to be considered, the pupil who is familiar with 
the formal practices before that time should be led to 
have a vivid appreciation of the new ideals, — political, 
industrial, commercial, etc., — that conflicted with the 
authority of old traditions, made these old traditions un- 
satisfactory, and precipitated a period of individualism 
in which men's attention was centered anew upon the 
values of human life. In order to appreciate this situa- 
tion, the pupil must feel the values of the new ideals which 
conflicted with the old. If he does not feel these values, 
the words which he uses to describe the situation lack 
true significance for him. In order to assist the pupil 
to acquire this appreciative understanding of the situa- 
tion, the teacher is justified in appealing to the pupil's 
own experiences, which, indeed, are the only material at 
the teacher's disposal for creating the situation in the 
pupil's imagination. Analogies are useful here. The 
pupil has experienced new values in conflict with old ones. 
The teacher as an artist may use this and other experi- 
ences in assisting the pupil to rebuild in imagination the 
purpose which led to the introduction of the study of 
classical Latin at the time of the Italian Renaissance. 
Mere generalizations which do not appeal to the pupil's 
feeling of value are cheap substitutes for the definite 
appreciations which should be given in this first step in 
the teaching of history. 

(2) When the pupil has acquired an appreciation of the 
purpose which called forth a new social practice, he should 
be led to associate with this purpose the new practice as 



394 The Principles of Education 

a means devised far attaining it. When the pupil has 
appreciated the Renaissance purpose of making the most 
out of human life, for example, he should next understand 
how classical literature provided the means which men of 
the time felt was necessary for guiding them to realize 
this purpose. This literature records the best experience 
of highly civilized peoples who for generations struggled 
to realize an ideal similar to that which Italians under the 
influence of the Renaissance were eager to realize. Some 
brief representative selections from this literature would 
be useful here to enable the pupil to understand how it 
met the needs of these Italians. The pupil cannot relive 
the historical situation, and thereby understand and 
appreciate its significance, without some insight into this 
literature. It is one thing to tell the pupil that at the 
time of the Renaissance the classics helped Italians to 
attain their purpose; it is another thing to cause the 
pupil to feel the desire of those who participated in the 
Renaissance movement and to understand through some 
knowledge of the content of the classical literature used 
how this literature helped to satisfy their desire. The 
pupil must reenact in imagination the essential parts of 
the drama of the past, if history is to become a genuine 
part of his experience. 

(3) So long as the pupil is dealing with the past, the 
third step, — that is, using the means in realizing the 
purpose, — must of necessity be merely a fiat of the will 
which accepts the means as in the service of the purpose. 

Society never reaches the end of its purposes. Chang- 
ing conditions bring new appreciations of value. In 
studying the historical change from emphasis upon the 
content of the classics to emphasis upon the linguistic 
for.XLS, the pupil should be led to appreciate the purposes 



The Methods of Teaching 395 

which, in turn, were responsible for this change. Later, 
as he reaches in his study the apparent enrichment that 
comes to this formalism when it is regarded as a means 
of formal discipline, he should be led to appreciate the 
value of mental power as it was then understood, in com- 
parison with the value of any specific content of facts. 
At that time the facts one might learn appeared compara- 
tively narrow and limited in application and not at all 
certain to be those needed later to guide one's activity, 
but mental power was evidently useful in the guiding of 
activity in all situations. Facts could be acquired 
readily when needed, but mental power could be devel- 
oped only by a long process of training. To those who 
believed in formal discipline it appeared that the formal 
study of language would develop this mental power. 
Although later thinkers have proved the doctrine of 
formal discipline to be erroneous, the student of the his- 
tory of education should appreciate how it appeared to 
the people of the period he is studying. 

If the pupil does not know that the doctrine of formal 
discipline is erroneous, the teacher may prevent the fixing 
of this false idea by remarking incidentally that later 
scientists found the doctrine of formal discipline untrue ; 
but the detailed study of the scientific refutation of this 
doctrine as it appeared later in the development of edu- 
cational thought would, if introduced in the study of the 
time when the doctrine first appeared historically, spoil 
the pupil's historical perspective. In the study of the 
history of education, the pupil should not take up this 
refutation until he has reached the period in historical de- 
velopment when it appeared. 

The general steps that have been illustrated above are 
essential to the teaching of any historical change, whether 



396 The Principles of Education 

in politics, industry, education, religion, or in any other 
department of social activity. It may be a change in a 
written creed, the establishment of a protective tariff, a 
new practice in educational administration, the introduc- 
tion of a new subject into a school curriculum, or the 
passing of a law. If the pupil does not have an apprecia- 
tion of the value of the purposes which people living at the 
time felt when they introduced the new practice, it is the 
duty of the teacher to help him build up this appreciation ; 
if he does not have an understanding of how the new prac- 
tice was devised in the service of this purpose, it is the 
duty of the teacher to help him get this understanding. 

Even in the case of minor social practices, the pupil 
should be led to appreciate the ends which they served. 
In studying the use of rivalry as a motive in Jesuit educa- 
tion, for example, the pupil should be led to appreciate 
the purpose of overcoming the monotony of short lessons 
and many reviews in a subject matter not well suited to 
the interests of youths. He should be led to appreciate 
also that the Jesuit purpose of maintaining kindly rela- 
tions with the pupils forbade the use of the fear of pun- 
ishment as a motive for study. 

The use of the means in realizing the purpose must, 
we have said, be only a fiat of the will which accepts the 
new practice as a means to the appreciated purpose. 
When, however, the web of historical connections be- 
tween the changing purposes and the changing practices 
devised to realize them has been woven up to the present 
time in the pupil's experience, he recognizes in present- 
day social practices values that directly affect his practical 
action. So far as possible, the school should offer oppor- 
tunity for the pupil to engage in social activities for the 
sake of these values. 



The Methods of Teaching 397 

Many teachers now believe that the pupil should learn 
history by solving problems. The principles of teaching 
given are entirely consistent with this belief. Without 
problems the pupil does not think in his study. The 
steps which we have outlined make adequate provision for 
thinking and are intended to show what kinds of problems, 
subsidiary to these steps, the pupil should undertake to 
solve. His problems should assist him in acquiring the 
experience called for by the essential steps in the study of 
history. These steps, to repeat, are (1) to appreciate the 
purpose which induced people of the past to devise the in- 
stitutional practice he is studying historically, (2) to as- 
sociate with this purpose the practice as a means devised 
for attaining it, and (3) to accept in imagination the prac- 
tice as serving the purpose. The pupil is not studying 
history if his problems are to find what lessons people of 
the present may learn from the experiences of earlier gen- 
erations or to estimate the values of earlier practices in 
the light of scientific conclusions of the present. If these 
are his problems, he has turned from the study of history 
to the study of science; the function of which is not to give 
appreciative insight into present practices, but to perfect 
our present practices when their aims have been intelli- 
gently appreciated. 

Ill 

• 

In the teaching of literature and of the other fine arts, the steps, 
which correspond to those in the teaching of history, are to make 
the pupil (1) appreciate through analysis and synthesis the value 
presented in the work of art, (2) associate with this appreciated 
value the means of realizing it, and (3) use the means in attaining 
the value. 

Let us now consider the teaching of literature and of 
the other fine arts in the light of the three steps through 



398 The Principles of Education 

which a new purpose is developed. These steps are num- 
bered as they appear in the discussion. 

(1) The purposes which the pupil should appreciate 
in the normal study of literature are those presented by 
the literary selections which he studies. As in the case 
of the study of history, there must be some purpose which 
leads the pupil to turn from his present activity, what- 
ever it may be, to the study of a literary selection. This 
purpose may be to improve his appreciations of worth, to 
secure pleasure, to enrich his topics for conversation, 
to fulfill the requirements for graduation from school, to 
secure approval by his teacher, or to attain some other 
object which he feels worth while. The desire to use 
literature for the sake of improving one's appreciations 
of worth is the best motive, because it is based upon a true 
understanding of the function of literature. However, 
as the pupil lives in imagination through the experiences 
presented, the motive which turned his attention to lit- 
erary study is, under normal conditions, soon lost in a 
sympathetic appreciation of the values included in the 
work of literary art. 

The appreciation of the values presented in a work of 
literary art is secured through analysis and synthesis. 
Just as many colors may be blended in a painting to give 
the unitary effect of a glorious sunset, so various values, as 
we have learned, may be combined in a literary selection 
to give a unitary appreciation in the experience of the 
reader. If the pupil does not strongly appreciate the 
values represented by the imagery in a work of literary 
art and is not strongly sensitive to the more direct appeal 
made by the beauty of form, the teacher should have him 
study each value separately to develop his appreciation 
of it. In other words, there should be an analysis of the 



The Methods of Teaching 399 

literary selection into the particular values which it pre- 
sents. After feelings of worth have thus been developed 
separately, they should be combined into a unitary appre- 
ciation. This synthesis comes through experiencing, the 
literary selection as a whole. Let us now consider illus- 
trations of the use of analysis and synthesis as the means 
of securing the appreciation of worth; which is the first 
essential step in the teaching of literature. 

The Twenty-Third Psalm normally presents a number 
of particular values,. such as those of the good shepherd, 
the still waters, the green pastures, and the protection 
against enemies, while the rhythmic form of the poem 
makes a direct appeal to feeling. The experience of a 
pupil in modern times is so different from that of the prim- 
itive people for whom this poem was written that for him 
the images presented probably do not carry with them 
strong feelings of worth. He has not acquired strong 
purposes to attain the things which were of paramount 
importance in the life of a pastoral people. If he does not 
appreciate these values, the teacher should lead him to 
analyze the psalm into the particular images presented 
and to study each separately. In accordance with the 
law which controls the development of new purposes, the 
teacher can then develop a feeling of value for the good 
shepherd, the still waters, the green pastures, and the 
protection against enemies, by presenting each of these as 
a means of realizing purposes for which the pupil has 
acquired appreciation. The teacher should lead the 
pupil to build through constructive imagination concrete 
imagery of the precarious life of a pastoral people that 
would enable him in a measure to relive the experiences 
which caused them to appreciate strongly the images 
presented in the psalm. For example, the pupil, drawing 



400 The Principles of Education 

upon his own limited experience, can in imagination follow 
the shepherd and the sheep through the hot and dusty 
fields to the deep well of cool water, which receives value 
from the important purpose it serves. Verbal descrip- 
tions, pictures, and stories of pastoral life are useful in 
helping the pupil's imagination. When due appreciation 
has been acquired for each of the images presented in the 
psalm, further appreciation may be developed through 
the direct appeal of the rhythmic music of the poetry, 
which, if necessary, may be given special attention. The 
psalm taken as a whole unites these appreciations of 
worth. Oral reading is an important help in this synthesis. 
Let us consider next the teaching of Browning's poem 
entitled Cleon. Browning represents Cleon as having 
the richest blessings the world can give, and uses image 
after image to create an appreciation of these blessings. 
He says : 

The master of thy galley still unlades 
Gift after gift ; they block my court at last 
And pile themselves along its portico 
Royal with sunset, like a thought of thee. 

Appreciation of the value of the gifts is increased by the 
poetic description of them. Nature as well as the king 
has been generous with Cleon, who says : 

I have not chanted verse like Homer, no — 

Nor swept string like Terpander, no — nor carved 

And painted men like Phidias and his friend : 

I am not great as they are, point by point. 

But I have entered into sympathy 

With these four, running these into one soul, 

Who, separate, ignored each other's arts. 

Say, is it nothing that I know them all? 

The wild flower was the larger ; I have dashed 



The Methods of Teaching 401 

Rose-blood upon its petals, pricked its cup's 
Honey with wine, and driven its seed to fruit, 
And show a better flower if not so large : 
I stand myself. Refer this to the gods 
Whose gift alone it is ! which, shall I dare 
(All pride apart), upon the absurd pretext 
That such a gift by chance lay in my hand, 
Discourse of lightly or depreciate? 

Although Cleon has all these blessings, both material and 
spiritual, he longs for a personal immortality compared 
with which these blessings amount to nothing. This 
desire is expressed in the words : 

I dare at times imagine to my need 

Some future state revealed to us by Zeus, 

Unlimited in capability 

For joy, as this is in desire for joy, 

— To seek which, the joy-hunger forces us : 

That, stung by straitness of our life, made strait 

On purpose to make prized the life at large — 

Freed by the throbbing impulse we call death, 

We burst there as the worm into the fly, 

Who, while a worm still, wants his wings. But no ! 

Zeus has not yet revealed it ; and alas, 

He must have done so, were it possible ! 

If the poem does not excite appropriate feelings on 
the part of the pupil, the teacher should lead him to 
analyze it into the various images presented and to 
acquire an appreciation of each image. The. pupil 
should in imagination see vividly the rich gifts along the 
portico royal with sunset; he should appreciate the 
significance of Homer, Terpander, and Phidias ; he 
should feel Cleon's despair despite worldly blessings, 
when, confronted only by death and oblivion, he longs 
for " some future state . . . unlimited in capability for 



402 The Principles of Education 

joy, as this is in desire for joy." History and mythology 
may be used to advantage in aiding the pupil to acquire 
the appreciations called for by the poem. The various 
feelings of worth aroused by this poem should not, how- 
ever, remain separate; they should be united in such 
manner as to make a composite feeling of the worth of 
personal immortality. When the pupil has acquired 
appreciations of the particular values presented, these 
appreciations should be united into one feeling of worth 
through the intimate connections which the poem as a 
whole establishes among them. 

(2) In accordance with the law which controls the 
making of new purposes, we find that the second step in 
the teaching of literature is to bring the appreciated value 
into intimate association with the means of realizing it, 
so that the value may be transferred from the end to the 
means. The Twenty-Third Psalm brings the end and the 
means together in a way so simple and direct that the 
pupil would probably take this step without the assistance 
of the teacher. The pupil should readily see that following 
the Lord as the sheep follow the shepherd is the means of 
attaining the values called to mind by the psalm. The 
combined appreciations which the pupil has for the shep- 
herd, the green pastures, the still waters, and the pro- 
tection against enemies may now be transferred to 
following the Lord, which, having received this transferred 
value, itself becomes a purpose. If the pupil does not see 
the analogy between the sheep following the shepherd 
and the person following the Lord, his attention should be 
called to ways in which he might follow the Lord by doing 
what the Lord would have him do in following religious 
precepts. But in the case of the poem by Browning, 
since it is merely suggested that Christianity is the means 



The Methods of Teaching 403 

to the value for which Cleon longed, 1 the pupil may need 
the assistance of the teacher in associating the means with 
the end. If such assistance is needed, the teacher should 
lead the pupil to make the association by suggestion 
rather than by telling him directly. In so far as the pupil 
himself discovers the connection between the means and 
the end, the effect is more vivid and lasting. In Tenny- 
son's Flower in the Crannied Wall the pupil should be led 
to recognize the little flower as a means of revealing the 
mysteries of the nature of God and man ; if the individual 
could only understand the flower, he could read in it the 
secret of the universe. 

It is not necessary that the second step follow the 
first in time ; the two may be taken at the same time, in 
which case the second step is distinguished from the first 
logically rather than chronologically. In the Twenty- 
Third Psalm, following the Lord is represented as the 
means for the attainment of each value in turn when this 
value is called to mind. The synthesis of values which 
combine to make the reader desire to follow the Lord as 
the sheep follow the shepherd takes place normally while 
the means is being associated with an end in each new 
image called to mind. In Cleon, on the other hand, the 
unitary appreciation is developed before Christianity is 
suggested as the means of realizing it. 

(3) In accordance with the law which controls the 
making of new purposes, the third step in the teaching of 
literature is to provide opportunity for the pupil to use 
the means in realizing the end. The simplest action that 
the pupil can take in this direction is to acknowledge the 
truth of the relationship between the means and the end 

1 This suggestion is made by the incidental reference to St. Paul in 
-the last stanza, which is quoted on page 222. 



404 The Principles of Education 

represented by the work under discussion. This action 
tends to transfer the value from the end to the means and 
thus to make a new ideal which may function when the 
opportunity is offered. The new ideal is more likely to be 
fixed in the experience of the pupil, however, if the 
teacher provides opportunities for a fuller action in 
acquiring the appreciated value. Under the inspiration 
of the Twenty-Third Psalm, the pupil may be led to do 
some good act which may be interpreted as following the 
Lord ; under the inspiration of the poem Cleon, he may be 
led to do something for the sake of the Christian religion ; 
under the inspiration of Tennyson's poem Flower in the 
Crannied Wall, he may be led to give some unaccustomed 
attention to a flower. If the pupil does not act in some 
way under the guidance of the literary selection studied, 
the appreciation aroused in him becomes mere vapid senti- 
mentality, which is worse than useless, because it dulls his 
sensitiveness to the influence of other literary selections. 

The essential steps in the teaching of the other fine arts 
are the same as those in the teaching of literature. (1) 
The teacher should lead the pupil to analyze the work of 
art into the various elements through which it excites 
appreciation 1 and should assist him to appreciate strongly 
each of these elements. He should lead the pupil also 
to make a synthesis of the appreciations thus developed 
for the purpose of forming a unitary feeling of value. 
In the study of Turner's painting, The Slave Ship, 2 the 
teacher should guide the attention of the pupil to such 
elements as the dismantled ship, the manacled human 
beings struggling in the stormy waves, the sun about to 
give the tragedy over to the darkness of night. As the 
pupil through constructive imagination brings the impli- 
1 See pp. 227-236. 2 See pp. 230-231. 



The Methods of Teaching 405 

cations of each to consciousness, his appreciations are 
strengthened. When, later, he studies the painting as a 
whole, these feelings become united into a single appre- 
ciation. In assisting the pupil to study the Laocoon 
Group 1 the teacher, allowing the pupil as much initiative 
as possible, should guide him to study such elements as 
the beauty of form and the strength of body of Laocoon 
and his sons, the physical suffering of the helpless victims 
of the serpents, and the father's grief over the terrible 
death which he has brought upon his innocent offspring. 
Consideration -of the statue as a whole will then unite the 
feelings incited by a study of the elements. To increase 
the pupil's appreciation of a musical composition, the 
teacher should direct his attention to such elements as the 
chief theme, its development and relation to secondary 
themes, the flow of melody throughout the piece, and the 
harmonic structure of the composition. In order to in- 
crease the pupil's appreciation in this study, the teacher 
may use tones and combinations of tones for which the 
pupil has acquired appreciation ; he may use also imagery 
that carries with it in the experience of the pupil feelings 
similar to those which the music should excite. A syn- 
thesis of the feelings developed through a study of the 
elements is made when the selection is heard as a whole. 

(2) As the second step, in the case of Turner's The Slave 
Ship, the teacher should guide the pupil to recognize a 
causal connection between slavery and the horrible scene 
of the slave ship so that the pupil may feel through a 
transfer of negative value an aversion to slavery. In the 
case of the Laocoon Group, he should lead the pupil to 
recognize that Laocoon's defiance of a supernatural power 
led to the suffering represented by the statue. In the 
1 See pp. 228-229. 



406 The Principles of Education 

case of a musical composition, he should direct the pupil's 
attention to whatever, as a means to the value presented 
by the music, should have this value transferred to it. 
That to which this value should be transferred may be 
such a thing as an idea suggested by a symphony or pre- 
sented by the words sung to music, some act of religious 
worship, the home circle, or some patriotic undertaking. 

(3) The third step in the teaching of the other fine 
arts, as in the teaching of literature, may be only to guide 
the pupil to have a will attitude acknowledging the 
relation of the means to the end, or it may be to lead 
the pupil to some further action under the influence of 
the work of art. 

It is commonly recognized that, other things being 
equal, a person who has a strong appreciation of a work 
of literature or other fine art is able to teach it better than 
a person who does not have so strong an appreciation of 
it. A person who is guided to a new purpose by a work 
of art must have strongly experienced the essential steps 
necessary to acquire this new appreciation. He may, 
therefore, be guided by his own experience so to empha- 
size for the pupil these same steps that the pupil gets 
a similar purpose. When, however, feeling is guided 
by a rational insight into the process by which a work of 
art can guide the pupil to a new ideal, the teacher has a 
more definite aid to accuracy and effectiveness than mere 
feeling; he knows precisely what steps the pupil must 
take in order to get a new value, and is, therefore, not 
likely to make omissions or to give emphasis to non- 
essentials. Appreciation, then, accompanied by rational 
insight into the process through which this appreciation 
is developed is a more definite guide in teaching than 
feeling alone. 



The Methods of Teaching 407 

IV 

In the teaching of history and of the fine arts, the methods that 
should be used in the study, the review, and the examination 
lessons depend upon the steps in teaching explained in the two 
preceding sections. 

We have thus far considered the teaching of history and 
of the fine arts when the teacher is with the pupil through- 
out the work. Let us now apply the principles for teach- 
ing new purposes to the study lesson, in which the work is 
done in private, and to the review and the examination 
lessons. 

In assigning the study lesson, the teacher must antici- 
pate the difficulties of the pupil and give him the guidance 
necessary to overcome them. In the case of history, 
study should consist of reading plus thinking. The 
reading matter is easily available in the textbooks; 
the pupil needs the teacher's guidance merely with regard 
to what he should think about in connection with his 
reading. Should he try merely to understand the sen- 
tences of the book in the order in which they are given? 
Should he try to remember the facts as they are presented 
in the book? Should he make an outline of the important 
topics and commit this outline to memory? Since study 
is self -teaching and since history is purpose-giving subject 
matter, the principles which control the making of new 
purposes should indicate to the teacher that about which 
the pupil should think. If the subsidiary problems thus 
indicated are difficult, the teacher should give the pupil 
the guidance he needs in order to solve them. The 
amount of assistance necessary in the assignment of 
the lesson decreases as the pupil gains the ability to 
direct his own study, or, in other words, to teach himself. 

The assignment should give the pupil a definite motive 



408 The Principles of Education 

for further study and also a knowledge of the method he 
should use in order to get the results intended. In 
making the assignment the teacher should be guided by 
the same principles that guide him in the recitation lesson 
described above. The only difference is that his guidance 
must be given before the pupil begins to study and not 
from step to step in the progress of the study. 

Let us consider, for example, what the teacher should do 
in assigning a lesson through the study of which the 
pupil is to acquire an appreciation of the new educational 
purpose responsible for the important changes in educa- 
tion in Massachusetts from 1835 to 1860. The main 
problem for the pupil to consider in his study in this 
case would be why the people became dissatisfied with the 
traditional educational practices and sought to change 
them. As the people became dissatisfied with the tradi- 
tional education because they had a new educational 
purpose, the pupil in answering the question adequately 
should be led to acquire an appreciation of this new pur- 
pose. The statement of this one problem may be all 
that is necessary to guide the private study of an advanced 
student. In the case of a less advanced pupil where 
further guidance is necessary, the teacher may assist the 
pupil to imagine the educational situation in Massa- 
chusetts. He may call the pupil's attention to the 
religious purpose which was responsible in a large measure 
for the educational practices of the time and to the 
weakening of this purpose by toleration, the rise of various 
creeds, and the tendency to transfer the burden of religious 
education from the school to the home and the church. 
He may call the pupil's attention also to the rise of the 
district school system, and to other matters which would 
help him to appreciate the educational situation with 



The Methods of Teaching 409 

which the new purpose made the people dissatisfied. If 
still more specific guidance is needed, the teacher may- 
ask the pupil to find why the growth of the democratic 
government since the American Revolution, the growth of 
cities with manufacturing interests fostered by the tariff 
of 1816, and the acquaintance with the changes which 
the Pestalozzian movement brought about in Prussian 
education would make the people dissatisfied with their 
schools. When in solving these problems the pupil is 
led to appreciate the new political and industrial pur- 
poses and to see how the people recognized that the 
school should serve these new ideals, he can then appre- 
ciate practical efficiency as a new educational purpose. 
The appreciation of the end is transferred to the means 
as both are associated in the mind of the pupil. This 
appreciation may be made more definite in the light of 
the criticisms which those still interested in religious 
education and in classical education made of the new 
educational tendencies. 

A lesson assignment to find the new purpose which was 
responsible for changes in political, industrial, religious, 
or other social practices may be made in the same way. 
The pupil should be given the problems of finding what 
caused dissatisfaction with the old practice, and what 
influences established the new purpose. In solving these 
subsidiary problems through private study, he is guided 
through the steps necessary to give him an appreciation 
of the new purpose. 

If the main aim of the lesson assigned is for the pupil 
to learn the new practices introduced at any particular 
time, the teacher should in the assignment call the atten- 
tion of the pupil to the new social purpose in the interest 
of which these new practices were devised, and leave 



410 The Principles of Education 

with the pupil as a guide to his study the question : 
How in the judgment of the people of the time did the new 
practices serve this purpose? If further direction is 
needed by the pupil, the teacher may lead him to under- 
stand the difficulties in which the people found them- 
selves and then ask the question : What means did the 
people devise to overcome each of these difficulties ? Each 
means devised, if adopted, would be a new social practice. 
If the new lesson is to find the new social practices intro- 
duced into education at the time of the revival of educa- 
tion in Massachusetts from 1835 to 1860, the first step 
in the assignment would be to make the pupil strongly 
appreciate the new educational purpose as presented 
above, and at the same time understand the traditional 
educational situation. His problem in study would then 
be to find how the new practices were devised to serve 
the new educational purpose. If further direction is 
necessary, his attention could be called to some of the 
difficulties in the way of making educational practices 
serve the new purpose of social efficiency. Such needs 
as better teachers, better equipment, better supervision, 
and better administration, should be discovered by the 
pupil under the direction of the teacher. Then the pupil 
is prepared to find in his study how normal schools were 
established for the better training of teachers, how a state 
school fund was secured and local taxation for school 
purposes stimulated, how a state board of education 
was established, and how steps were taken to abolish 
the inefficient district system in the interest of a more 
centralized administration. The pupil may be guided 
in a similar manner to appreciate the changes in any 
institutional practices, — political, religious, industrial, 
or domestic, as well as educational. 



The Methods of Teaching 411 

The steps in the making of a new purpose, which we 
found at the basis of method in the teaching of history, 
should be the guides in the review and the examination 
lesson. 

The main purpose of the review lesson in history is to 
organize the pupil's historical experience which has been 
developed through detailed study. The basis of this 
organization should be the more comprehensive pur- 
poses which have led to changes in social practice. This 
organization should be kept intact from detailed lesson 
to detailed lesson by connecting the particular period 
studied with the general movements which have preceded 
it. In this way the details will appear in relation to a 
comprehensive organization of such general movements 
as the Italian Renaissance, the Protestant Reformation, 
and the movements towards political and industrial 
democracy. Subdivisions of these should also be made 
on the basis of purposes. For example, the Protestant 
Reformation, which emphasized the value of intelligent 
faith for salvation, logically led to the movements for 
universal, vernacular, and compulsory education, which 
in turn became the ends to be attained. In Germany it 
led to the ideal of state education and in England to the 
purpose of education under the direction of church 
societies, etc. If the pupil has learned through detailed 
analysis all the particular movements, the various minor 
purposes involved, and the changes in practice to which 
they led, his whole experience of the general movement 
is unified through review. 

To determine directly by examination whether the 
pupil's study of history has brought the results for which 
historical study is normally intended, is difficult, because 
these results are appreciations of value. We can, how- 



412 The Principles of Education 

ever, easily test these results indirectly by finding through 
examination whether the pupil has acquired a true insight 
into the relation between the historical purposes and the 
historical practices which would give him an appreciative 
understanding of the present social activities. One 
direct test of the pupil's appreciative understanding of 
an historical situation is to have him make judgments 
from the point of view of the people of the period studied. 
In the history of education, this can be done by such 
questions as the following : What is the most important 
criticism that Johann Sturm would have made of Vittorino 
da Feltre's school at Mantua, and why would he have made 
this criticism ? What is the main adverse criticism which 
Herbert Spencer would have made of the method advo- 
cated by Rousseau for determining the curriculum? 
What reply would those under the influence of traditional 
educational practices at some particular time have made 
to the criticisms of some particular educational reformer 
who advocated changes in their educational practices? 

If the pupil answers such questions correctly and with- 
out assistance when they are put before him for the first 
time, he probably has an appreciative insight into the 
educational situations involved in the questions. More- 
over, it is economical to test the pupil's insight into two 
situations by one question and answer. Proper examina- 
tions not only test the pupil's accomplishment, but also 
educate him by strengthening and making definite his 
historical experience. 

A work of literary art should normally make an imme- 
diate appeal to the experience of those who read it. A 
poem may, however, strike unresponsive cords in the 
experience of many persons, for individuals vary greatly 
in the feelings of value which the images of the poem call 



The Methods of Teaching 413 

forth. The images of the Twenty-Third Psalm were un- 
doubtedly accompanied by strong feelings born of experi- 
ence on the part of those who, like David, lived a pastoral 
life, but these images may arouse only a weak response 
in the experience of persons living under modern condi- 
tions. The poem Cleon would make an immediate appeal 
to a person with the rich experience of Browning, but the 
immature pupil may have to acquire a variety of new 
experiences before he can appreciate the values which the 
imagery of the poem would normally call forth. When a 
work of literary art does not make an immediate appeal 
to the experience of the reader, study is necessary to 
furnish him with an appreciation of the values which the 
images should call forth. This fact points to the char- 
acter of the problems necessary for a study lesson in 
literature. These problems, which should always be sub- 
sidiary to the main steps in the teaching of literature, 
should lead the pupil to acquire the experience which will 
enable him to feel the values that the work of literary art 
should normally call forth. In his book The Teaching of 
Poetry in the High School, Professor A. H. R. Fairchild 
says : 

The study of a poem, unless the poem be of the very simplest kind, 
should always begin in class ; if, in beginning a poem, an assignment 
for home study is made at all, it should be in material bearing upon 
the poem and essential to understanding it, not a part of the poem 
itself. 

The reason for this plan becomes apparent on a moment's reflec- 
tion. The study of poetry in the high school implies that the poem 
in hand represents some thought, feeling, or action that is an ideal 
for the pupil. To the teacher this ideal may be very simple, very 
elementary, perhaps long since attained ; but for the pupil it repre- 
sents something relatively new or as yet unattained in experience. 
Required to make his own start in beginning the study of a poem, 



414 The Principles of Education 

lacking the inspiration of the teacher and the stimulus of the class, 
blocked frequently by unfamiliar allusions and confused imagery, 
the pupil easily becomes discouraged and turns from his task in weari- 
ness and defeat. On the morrow he does not know his "lesson." 
The teacher works in vain against a dogged opposition; and the 
finest pedagogical efforts toward stirring interest and awakening 
enthusiasm fall dead. The pupil is right, the teacher wrong. The 
pupil's lack of interest, his opposition, even his dislike for poetry 
are the natural and almost inevitable result of a vicious method. 
What the pupil usually lacks is the necessary imagery or information 
to make the poem intelligible to him. Without this "apperception 
mass," as the psychologists call it, any poem must be largely mis- 
understood, if indeed it does not appear to be veritable rubbish. 1 

When the teacher has secured motivation for the study 
of the Twenty-Third Psalm, problems assigned to direct 
the pupil's private study should lead the pupil to an 
appreciative understanding of the life of a pastoral people. 
The answers to these problems may be found in assigned 
readings. Similarly when the teacher has secured motiva- 
tion for the study of the poem Cleon, he should assign 
problems which will guide the pupil to appreciate the 
various values which the poem presents. What these 
values are in the case both of the Twenty-Third Psalm 
and of Cleon has been explained in the section regarding 
the teaching of literature. There may be other problems 
intended to lead the pupil through the other steps which 
he must take in order to profit by the literary production ; 
but these steps are so subtle, so difficult to anticipate, 
that it is ordinarily better to leave them until the pupil 
has made the preliminary study discussed above and the 
teacher is present to follow the pupil's experience from 
detail to detail and to give him the necessary direction 
when in this way it is found to be needed. 

1 Pp. 71-72. 



The Methods of Teaching 415 

The study lesson in the other fine arts is analogous to 
that in literature. The problems given to direct the 
pupil's study should be those necessary to bring his 
experience to the stage at which the work of art will make 
a direct appeal to his feeling. In the case of the Laocoon 
Group, such questions should be asked as will call the 
attention of the pupil to the story the culmination of 
which the statue represents, and to those details of the 
statue which make a strong appeal to feeling. In the 
study of Turner's The Slave Ship, questions should be 
asked which will lead the pupil to understand the nature 
of slavery and to appreciate the significant details of the 
painting. As in the case of literature, the problems as- 
signed to guide the pupil's study should always be sub- 
sidiary to the main steps in the development of a new 
purpose. 

In a review lesson covering various works of fine art, 
care should be taken that the unity of each is not lost in 
details. While the pupil may refresh his experience of 
some of the details, the main emphasis should be given 
to impressing upon him the unitary value which each work 
of art presents. 

It is difficult by examination to obtain evidence of 
feelings of value, which, as in the case of literature, are 
the normal result of the study of the other fine arts. One 
way of testing the result is to find whether the pupil has 
passed through the steps necessary to attain it. This 
indirect method is to question him with regarpl to the 
steps which we have emphasized as necessary for teach- 
ing the work of art. A more direct way of finding the 
result is to have the pupil make judgments of value on 
the basis of the new appreciation of worth which the 
study of the work of art has given him. In the light 



416 The Principles of Education 

of such study, he may be asked to pass judgment upon 
some type of character or to compare the values of 
specific acts. 



In the teaching of control subject matter, the steps are to make 
the pupil (1) try to attain some purpose in the realizing of which 
he meets a difficulty that can be overcome by the new means of 
control about to be presented, (2) locate the difficulty by making 
and testing hypotheses, (3) solve in a similar way the problem 
arising from this difficulty, and (4) use the solution in attaining 
his original purpose. In the second and third steps, which are the 
most difficult ones, the teacher should guide the pupil from the 
known to the unknown by calling his attention to familiar facts 
which through analogy suggest the proper hypotheses and to those 
which test the truth of the hypotheses made by the pupil. 

In order to find how a new means of control should be 
taught to the pupil, it is necessary for us to recall the 
essential steps in the complete thought process through 
which a new means of control is made. These steps 
are (1) feeling a difficulty in the realization of a purpose, 
(2) defining the problem by making hypotheses based 
upon analogy and testing them either in thought or in 
action, (3) solving the problem through making hypoth- 
eses based on analogy and testing them either in thought 
or in action, and (4) using the means thus found in realiz- 
ing the original purpose. 1 In the light of our discussion of 
these steps, let us now find the essentials in teaching a 
means of control. 

(1) The first step in teaching a control lesson is to lead 
the pupil to try to attain some purpose in the realizing of 
which he will meet a difficulty that can be overcome by 
the new means of control about to be presented. This 
step is commonly called motivation, a word derived from 
» See Ch. V. 



The Methods of Teaching 417 

the Latin verb movere, meaning to move. In this step the 
pupil moves towards the realization of some end he has in 
view. 

The purpose used in motivation must have two char- 
acteristics : (a) it must be one for the value of which the 
pupil has already developed an appreciation, and {b) it 
must be one in the realizing of which the pupil meets some 
difficulty that may be overcome by the means of control 
about to be taught. The purpose cannot function in the 
pupil's experience as a motive, it cannot be a purpose for 
him, unless he appreciates its value. Since the meaning 
of a thing is its use, 1 he cannot understand the new 
means of control which is to be taught unless he sees 
its use in overcoming some difficulty in the attaining 
of a purpose. 

Since the meaning of a thing is its use, the motive, in 
order to develop a normal meaning, should be one in the 
service of which the new means of control is normally 
used. The motive, in other words, should give the 
pupil an intrinsic rather than an extrinsic interest in the 
new means of control. 2 Not only does extrinsic interest 
lead, as we have learned, to abnormal meanings, but it 
does not make the pupil responsive to situations in the 
social life beyond the school, because it does not cause 
him to associate with the means of control he has acquired 
in school the purposes normally calling for them in the 
wider social life. He cannot hear the voice of these 
purposes, because, while under the guidance of abnormal 
motives in school, he has not been taught to recognize it. 

The teacher can usually secure extrinsic interest more 

i See pp. 114-115. 

2 For an explanation of the difference between intrinsic and ex- 
trinsic interest, see pp. 133-137. 



418 The Principles of Education 

easily than he can secure intrinsic interest. In order to 
find motives that give intrinsic interest, he must have an 
insight into the social purposes upon which the meanings 
of the things depend, and he must also discover which of 
these purposes the pupil appreciates. The dullest school- 
master can use extrinsic motives, such as the pupil's 
desire to escape punishment or to secure an arbitrary- 
reward ; no great ability is required to find that every 
pupil responds to these motives. Consequently, fear of 
punishment was long used as a motive for learning, as is 
evident by the fact that the symbol of schoolmasters 
in the days of most inefficient teaching was a book and a 
bundle of switches. 

Since the purposes which give motivation to the means 
of control included in the curriculum are those for the 
realizing of which these means of control are normally 
used, the way to determine what purposes should be used 
for school motives is to look into the world beyond the 
school and to find what purposes are served there by these 
means of control. Let us consider the application of 
this principle. 

In many schools the motivation for reading aloud is 
extrinsic. The pupils are provided with copies of the 
same reading book. The teacher tells the class to turn to 
a certain page and calls upon William to read the first 
paragraph. William's motive for reading under these 
circumstances is to gain the approval of the teacher 
and to avoid the punishment which would result from a 
refusal to comply with the command of the teacher, or it 
may be that obeying such commands has, through school 
experience, become for him an end in itself. After William 
has read a paragraph, the teacher asks the other pupils 
to point out William's mistakes. Hands are raised and 



The Methods of Teaching 419 

fingers are snapped by pupils eager to tell the teacher 
that William mispronounced a word, neglected to pause 
at a period, failed to raise his voice at an interrogation 
point, etc. The pupils' motives here are to obey the 
teacher, to secure her approval, to show by criticizing 
William's reading that they are superior to him. The 
teacher next asks Sarah to show whether she can read the 
paragraph better than did William. Sarah, standing in 
the middle of the aisle with heels together and head 
erect, tries to excel her classmate. Sarah's motive is to 
excel in competition, a motive which in schoolroom 
practice has been second only to that of avoiding punish- 
ment. 

If we apply the principle given above for determining 
what motives should be used, the extrinsic nature of the 
motives in the illustration becomes apparent. Looking 
into the world beyond the school for an example of 
reading aloud under normal conditions, do we find that a 
farmer subscribes for as many copies of the rural news- 
paper as there are members of his family, and then, when 
the family has gathered about the fireplace at the end of 
the day, that he gives to each member of his family a copy 
of the paper, commands all to turn to a certain page, and 
orders one of his sons to read the first paragraph of the 
editorials? Does he then ask the other members of the 
family to point out the mistakes made by the son, and 
later require one of his daughters to try to read the first 
paragraph of the editorials better than did her brother? 
As is evident from this illustration, the normal motive 
for reading is to give pleasure or information to other 
persons; it is not to attain the purposes represented in 
the schoolroom situation given above. The normal 
motive for pointing out and correcting mistakes is to 



420 The Principles of Education 

enable the reader to interest or to inform others as 
effectively as possible. With such a motive, the pupil 
welcomes criticism and tries to profit by it, and the pupils 
who criticize do so in the spirit of social cooperation 
rather than in that of individual competition. 

Let us apply to the school spelling lesson the principle 
for determining what motives should be used. The 
spelling lesson is often given in connection with the reading 
lesson. After the pupils have attempted to memorize a 
list of words because the teacher has told them to do so, 
they write these words at the teacher's dictation. The 
teacher then indicates the mistakes in spelling and 
records the grades made by the pupils. The motivation 
throughout such an exercise is artificial and extrinsic. 
In life beyond the school the desire to spell correctly 
arises ordinarily in connection with writing, as in the 
case of writing a letter, rather than with reading, unless 
perchance one is reading proof. A person normally 
desires to spell, not because some one has commanded him 
to do so, but because he is not certain about the spelling 
of a word and wishes to become certain about it. Full 
intrinsic motivation would therefore require that the 
spelling experience arise out of the writing of something 
otherwise worth while. Even when a list of words is 
memorized and written from dictation, as in the illus- 
tration given above, the desire to become certain about 
the spelling of words can be secured if the teacher, instead 
of correcting the mistakes on the paper, indicates only 
that there is a certain number of misspelled words which 
the pupil should correct. The pupil will then look through 
the list until he comes to a word concerning the spelling 
of which he is not certain. In order to become certain 
with regard to the spelling of this word, he will then use 



The Methods of Teaching 421 

some means of control, such as rules for spelling. To the 
extent that this motivation is intrinsic, he will become 
sensitive to uncertainty about the spelling of words and, 
in seeking certainty, will improve his spelling even after 
his school training is over. 

Under the guidance of the principle for determining 
what motives should be used, we can easily see that read- 
ing, spelling, and arithmetic should get much of their 
motivation in the school as tools for doing other work that 
is more directly in the service of social values. Literature, 
history, geography, manual arts, all furnish opportunities 
for the use of these tools. In the case of a younger pupil, 
play affords intrinsic motivation by leading the child 
to use subject matter in normal ways. He may, for 
example, learn arithmetic, spelling, etc., in playing games 
felt to be worth while in themselves, or in imitating adults 
at storekeeping or housekeeping. 

This incidental teaching of reading, writing, and arith- 
metic does not mean that drill should be precluded. The 
pupil must drill in order to become skilled in the use of 
these tools, if his purpose is to be realized. Interest in 
control becomes intrinsic when the pupil seeks control 
for the sake of improving his ability to attain other 
values that are normally sought. He feels that he cannot 
play the game satisfactorily or do some valuable kind of 
work unless he has acquired the proficiency afforded by 
drill. He does not drill because the teacher commands 
him to do this, but because activities of social value com- 
mand him. 

Motivation is the most critical step in the teaching 
of a control lesson, because it determines the nature of the 
pupil's self-realization, or development, under the direc- 
tion of the school ; what his motive is that will the pupil 



422 The Principles of Education 

be also, if the means of control are available. In this 
step the school finds its highest salvation only when it 
loses itself in the service of normal social values. The 
pupil should be trained to follow the guidance of normal 
purposes which arise from the situations that are not 
peculiar to the school but belong to the wider social life. 
If the school creates situations peculiar to itself in which 
the authority of the teacher is substituted for the pur- 
poses of social life, the training received therein fails to 
make the pupil efficient, because, not being taught to 
recognize and follow these purposes, he is without guide 
when the teacher no longer directs him. 

(2) The second step in teaching a control lesson is 
leading the pupil to locate the difficulty; or, in other 
words, to define the problem. This should be done by 
making hypotheses on the basis of the analogy between 
this difficulty and some other which the pupil has located 
in a similar situation, and by testing these hypotheses 
either in thought or in action, or in both thought and 
action. In the case of reading aloud, for example, the 
pupil may feel a difficulty in attaining his normal pur- 
pose, if he finds that his hearers have not been interested 
in his reading. His desire to give entertainment or 
information is thwarted by some obstacle. In order to 
realize his purpose he must first find out definitely what 
this difficulty is. He begins to make hypotheses under 
the guidance of analogous situations with which he is 
familiar. As a listener he has found his own interest 
lagging when the reader spoke too rapidly or too slowly, 
when his voice was too loud or too soft, when his enun- 
ciation was indistinct. Has he himself committed one of 
these faults? This question can be answered by testing 
his reading with respect to the various faults mentioned. 



The Methods of Teaching 423 

He may remember that he has been reading loudly and 
thus at once dispense with the hypothesis that he may 
not have made himself heard. In class work other pupils 
may help him in this process of making and testing hy- 
potheses by offering in the spirit of cooperation criticisms 
of the reading which may occur to them. 

The difficulty in defining the problem is, as has been 
learned, in making the hypothesis. The teacher should 
assist the pupil here if it is necessary. The assistance 
should not, however, be given by telling him directly what 
the fault is, but by suggesting to him the analogous 
situations which will lead him to make an hypothesis 
defining the difficulty. In making this suggestion, the 
teacher may call the pupil's attention to situations in 
which the pupil as listener experienced and defined a 
similar difficulty when another pupil was reading. When 
the pupil finds the nature of the difficulty, his problem 
is to overcome it in his own reading. 

The presentation through suggestion of the hypothesis 
which locates the difficulty is well illustrated by the way 
in which a teacher conducted an English composition 
lesson designed to give the pupils an understanding of the 
fundamental image in description. A boy was reading 
before the class a description which he had written. His 
essay did not attain its object because the hearers could 
not form a mental image of that which he had attempted 
to describe. In trying to assist the writer to locate his 
difficulty, the other pupils could go no further than to say 
that the description was confusing. The teacher then 
offered assistance by exposing for only a moment the 
picture of a building and by asking the members of the 
class to tell what they saw. They could give only the 
general form of the building without details. When 



424 The Principles of Education 

the teacher suggested that there was some similarity 
between forming a mental image through seeing a picture 
and forming a mental image through hearing a descrip- 
tion, the pupils on the basis of this analogy easily made 
the hypothesis that perhaps the description should give 
a general view first and the details later. This hypothesis 
was tested, it may be added, by applying it to the boy's 
description. In this case the hypothesis appeared to be 
correct as the description was found to give no general 
view but to present only details. The truth of the hypoth- 
esis was still further tested when at the suggestion of the 
teacher the pupils examined some of Hawthorne's descrip- 
tions and found that this effective writer gave a general 
view at the beginning of each description. The teacher 
then told the class that the technical name for the general 
view is fundamental image. The pupil's next problem was 
how to present a fundamental image of the object which 
he was attempting to describe. 

(3) The third step in teaching a control lesson is to 
lead the pupil to solve the problem. This should be done 
by making hypotheses on the basis of the analogy of the 
problem with some other similar problem a solution for 
which the pupil knows, and by testing these hypotheses 
in thought or in action, or in both thought and action. 
As the hypothesis is based on analogy, the teacher can 
save much time and useless thought on the part of the 
pupil by suggesting the basis of the hypothesis in the 
previous experience of the pupil. Then the latter can 
make the leap from the known to the unknown. Unless 
the pupil does proceed from the known to the unknown 
on the basis of analogy, he cannot acquire the new truth 
which the lesson is intended to teach him. He may com- 
mit to memory and repeat words which symbolize the 



The Methods of Teaching 425 

new meaning, but he does not understand the new meaning 
itself. If the problem is to find why an apple drops from 
the tree to the ground, the teacher may call the attention 
of the pupil to the phenomenon of a piece of iron being 
attracted to a magnet. Through analogy the pupil 
can then make the hypothesis that perhaps the earth 
attracts the apple as the magnet attracts the piece of iron. 
If the problem is to find why the moon does not fall to 
the earth, the teacher may suggest the phenomenon of 
the pull which one feels when one swings in a circle a stone 
attached to a string. The pupil then makes the hypoth- 
esis that perhaps the circular motion of the moon about 
the earth may cause a pulling away that counteracts 
the force of the attraction between the two. If the 
problem is to find what causes evolution, the pupil's 
attention may be called to selective breeding in the case 
of animals and to the fact that competition for food and 
other forms of the struggle for existence act as selective 
factors in the case of living things. The pupil is then 
ready to make the hypothesis that perhaps these natural 
selective forces eliminate the unfit and leave the fit to 
transmit their traits to offspring. If the problem is to 
get a general notion of the nature of an adverb, the pupil 
may find a suitable analogy if his attention is called to 
the nature of the adjective, which the adverb resembles 
in function as a modifying part of speech. The pupil then 
makes the hypothesis that the adverb is like the adjective 
except that it modifies a different class of words. Good ex- 
amples of the solving of religious problems on the basis of 
analogy may be found in the parables given in the Bible. 
When the pupi 1 has formed an hypothesis, the teacher 
may assist him in testing it by calling attention to that 
which will invalidate a false hypothesis or sustain a true 



426 The Principles of Education 

one. It is much better for the teacher to assist the pupil 
in this way to test his own hypothesis than merely to 
tell him that his answer to the problem is correct or in- 
correct. When the teacher is expected arbitrarily to in- 
trude himself upon the situation by saying that the answer 
is correct or incorrect, the pupil's problem is changed 
from the normal one of finding what will overcome the 
difficulty that has been defined in the second step to the 
artificial problem of guessing what the teacher has in 
mind. The suggestion of facts that invalidate the hy- 
potheses offered by the one who is learning is an essential 
feature of the Socratic method of teaching. Socrates 
believed that men differ in opinion because they have 
seen only different parts of the truth and that men who 
see all sides of the truth will agree. When any one 
responded to his questioning with a false statement, 
Socrates would call his attention to some other aspect of 
the matter inconsistent with the answer. In this way he 
led his pupils to test their hypotheses, and so secured 
stronger convictions on their part than he could have 
secured by merely telling them whether in his judgment 
the answers were true or false. 

(4) The fourth step is the use of the solution in attain- 
ing the end for the sake of which the pupil located and 
defined his problem. When the pupil has found how to 
overcome some defect in his reading, he should make use 
of this knowledge to attain his original purpose; when 
he has found how to correct his spelling, he should spell 
the words properly ; when he has found how to improve 
his essay by using a fundamental image, he should use 
this knowledge in rewriting the essay ; when he has found 
how to overcome through drill some failure in arithmetical 
processes, he should devote himself to drill, and so on. 



The Methods of Teaching 427 

It will be noticed that in the illustrations no one lesson 
is carried through all four steps. In this connection it 
should be remembered that the knowledge of the nature 
of the steps is for the sake of helping the pupil where his 
learning process meets with some check. 1 In some lessons 
the chief difficulty is with motivation; in others, with 
defining the problem; in others, with solving the prob- 
lem ; and in others, with using the solution. In the case 
of drill, strong motivation is needed; if the pupil has 
had previous experience in drill, he needs no further 
guidance. In the case of the teaching of the fundamental 
image, the chief difficulty was with defining the problem. 
When the pupil found that his essay was at fault because 
he did not use a fundamental image, he could probably 
solve, without the assistance of the teacher, the problem 
of what sort of fundamental image he should give in his 
essay. The chief difficulty in teaching the nature of 
gravitation is to solve the problem. If the motivation 
is strong, the use of the solution in attaining the purpose 
will naturally follow. The chief function of the teacher 
here is to simplify the situation by precluding difficulties 
that would confuse the pupil with further problems be- 
fore he has realized his purpose. When, for example, the 
object of the lesson is to teach the use of the fundamental 
image, the teacher should not permit criticisms of various 
faults in the pupil's essay such as lack of unity in para- 
graphs, awkward forms of expression, loose sentences, etc. 
The way should be open for overcoming a single difficulty 
at a time. 

1 See p. 390. 



428 The Principles of Education 



VI 

In the teaching of control subject matter, the methods that should 
be used in the study, the review, and the examination lessons 
depend upon the steps in teaching explained in the preceding 
section. 

Let us now consider the study, review, and examination 
lessons in the teaching of control subject matter. 

Since in the study lesson the pupil for the time being 
directs his own learning, the teacher must anticipate the 
difficulties which the pupil will meet and, in assigning the 
lesson, give whatever assistance is necessary to enable 
him to overcome them. The less able the pupil is to 
guide his own study, the more definite and detailed the 
directions given in the assignment must be. When the 
pupil understands clearly how to study the lesson, he 
saves time and energy and is not so liable to meet with 
discouragement. 

The first step in assigning a study lesson is to give 
the pupil an intrinsic motive for study. This step may 
be supplemented by suggestions as to how he should con- 
duct his study/ in order that he may find the problem 
which the lesson undertakes to solve and the solution 
afforded for this problem. If more detailed guidance is 
necessary, the teacher may call the pupil's attention to 
whatever is necessary to assist him in private study to 
solve the problem, including references to books that will 
give the pupil assistance in his work. 

The pupil should be taught how to study books and ar- 
ticles with the greatest economy and profit, since these 
usually are the guides upon which the pupil must de- 
pend for learning when the teacher is not with him. In 
order properly to present control subject matter, a book 



The Methods of Teaching 429 

should set and solve some problem. This problem is often 
expressed in the title of the book as, for example, Pro- 
fessor Dewey's How We Think, Professor Moore's What 
is Education? Professor McMurry's How to Study, and 
Spencer's What Knowledge is of Most Worth? Often the 
title of a book or article merely implies a problem. Spen- 
cer's essay entitled Moral Education undertakes to solve 
the problem, What is the nature of moral education? 
Professor Dewey's Interest in Relation to Training of the 
Will undertakes to solve the problem. What is the relation 
of interest to the training of the will? Professor Char- 
ters' The Teaching of the Common Branches undertakes 
to solve the problem, How should the common branches 
be taught? In examining a book or an article, the pupil 
should first find what is the main problem considered. 
If this problem is such that the content promises to solve 
one of his own problems, the book or article becomes in- 
trinsically interesting to him. 

The author of a book must divide his main problem 
into minor problems in presenting the solution of it. To 
each of the more important of these minor problems a 
chapter may be devoted. In the second chapter of his 
book How to Study, Professor McMurry, recognizing that 
study involves thinking, analyzes the complete process 
of study into the following factors : the finding of specific 
purposes, the supplementing of thought, the organization 
of facts collected, the judging of the worth of statements, 
memorizing, the using of ideas, the tentative attitude, 
and provision for individuality. One by one the sub- 
sequent chapters deal respectively with how each of these 
factors is related to study. Professor Dewey simplifies 
the solution of the problem of what is the relation of 
interest to the training of the will by considering what 



430 The Principles of Education 

educational theory, psychology, and philosophy have to 
say about it, and then what conclusions should be made 
in the light of this information. A book which does not 
indicate directly or indirectly the relation of the problems 
of the several chapters to the main problem lacks unity 
and is in that respect poorly written. The problem of 
the chapter may in turn be simplified by subdividing it 
into the minor problems that are solved in the sections or 
paragraphs. 

The answer to the minor problem which a chapter or 
paragraph undertakes to solve is the key sentence. This 
answer is the essential point of the chapter or paragraph. 
The relation of the minor problems to the larger ones and 
of these to the main problem of the book or article reveals 
the relation of the essential points one to another. The 
problem of the preceding paragraph, for example, is, How 
does an author present the solution of the problem of his 
book? The answer is the key sentence, " The author of 
a book must, in presenting the solution of his main 
problem, divide the latter into minor problems." The 
rest of the paragraph makes the meaning of this key 
sentence more explicit by showing that the chapters 
and paragraphs constitute the solutions of the minor 
problems. 

In the case of control subject matter, the review lesson 
should give especial emphasis to the organization of the 
truths that have been studied. These truths are prop- 
erly related through the relation of the problems which 
they solve. A course or the subdivision of a course over 
which the review lesson extends has its main problem, to 
which the main truth of the course or of the subdivision 
is an answer. In the process of the solution this main 
problem has been subdivided into minor problems, and 



The Methods of Teaching 431 

these in turn have been still further subdivided. In this 
interrelation of problems we have the connections which 
hold the truths in their proper relationship, — not only 
those truths which are the solutions to the larger prob- 
lems, but also those which are the solutions of the simplest 
problems into which the larger ones have been subdivided. 
If the pupil reviews facts only as independent truths or 
if he organizes them in some arbitrary way, he fails to 
grasp the truths in that normal organization which is not 
only the most useful way for holding them in mind ready 
for application, but also the most economical way for 
understanding and retaining them. 

In the examination lesson, the most effective way for 
testing whether a pupil has acquired a means of control 
is to put him in a situation which calls for the use of it. 
This method furnishes an adequate test of the pupil's 
knowledge, because the meaning of a thing is its use. 
If the pupil is asked merely to reproduce statements of 
the truths which he has learned, he may reproduce 
remembered symbols the full meanings of which he does 
not understand even though he gives remembered illustra- 
tions of them ; but when he applies the truths in situations 
that normally call for their use, the memory of symbols 
cannot take the place of the understanding of meanings. 
This fact is generally recognized in the case of mathe- 
matics, where the pupil is required to use in the solving 
of problems the truths learned; it should be recognized 
in the case of all kinds of control subject matter. An 
examination lesson of this kind- is a valuable educational 
exercise as well as a test of the pupil's ability; every 
time a pupil uses a means of control, he acquires a more 
effective grasp of it. 



432 The Principles of Education 

VII 

Important perversions of teaching are (1) the use of extrinsic 
motivation, which gives abnormal meanings ; (2) telling, which 
is liable to neglect important steps in teaching ; (3) the over- 
emphasis of memory work, which interferes with the acquiring of 
purposes and ideas ; and (4) the confusion of appreciation and 
control lessons, which results in the use of a type of method not 
adapted to the subject matter. 

Important perversions of the methods of teaching are 
(1) the use of extrinsic motivation, (2) telling, (3) the 
overemphasis of memory work, and (4) the confusion of 
appreciation and control lessons. 

(1) We have considered the nature and disadvantages 
of extrinsic motivation. 1 Although in the degree that 
extrinsic motivation is used the pupil acquires perverted 
meanings, the use of extrinsic motivation is sometimes 
necessary, because under present educational limitations 
the teacher may not be able to devise situations that will 
appeal wholly to intrinsic motives. The teacher should 
make it a rule, however, to use the most intrinsic motiva- 
tion possible under the circumstances. 

(2) Telling is liable to leave missing links in the pro- 
cess of learning. In the case of purpose-giving subject 
matter, the teacher is often tempted to tell about the 
values presented instead of putting the pupil in the situa- 
tion where he feels these values. When this is done, 
the link which should connect the values intended to be 
presented with the pupil's acquired appreciations that 
would enable him to feel them, is missing. The teacher 
is tempted to tell also the connection between the value 
which the pupil should appreciate and the new means 
to which this value should be transferred, as when in 
literary study he repeats the moral of a work of lit- 

1 See pp. 133-137. 



The Methods of Teaching 433 

erary art. When this is done, the rational attitude in- 
volved in listening to a statement of a moral does not 
enable the pupil to make the transfer of value to the 
new means which is intended to receive it. He does not 
even feel the value. He may learn the words of the 
teacher and be able to talk about the subject matter, 
but he has not acquired the new appreciation for which 
this subject matter is normally a guide. When with the 
assistance of the teacher the pupil himself goes through 
the process for making new purposes or that for making 
new ideas, his difficulties reveal exactly what the teacher 
should do in assisting him, but when the pupil is told, 
there may be gaps in the learning process which the teacher 
can hardly discover. 

In the case of control subject matter, one important 
link which telling often neglects is that which connects 
the known with the unknown. Telling may not provide 
for the analogies which connect previous experience with 
the hypotheses that locate and solve the problem. To the 
extent that the pupil does not reach an hypothesis 
through its analogy with some known fact, he fails to 
understand the meaning of this hypothesis. After the 
teacher has told him, he may repeat the words that 
symbolize it ; but he has not necessarily acquired a true 
understanding of the meaning of these words. 

Another link needed which telling is liable to neglect is 
that which connects the hypotheses with the facts that 
should be used in testing them. If, instead of calling the 
pupil's attention to the facts that test his answer to the 
problem, the teacher tells him that the answer is right or 
wrong, the pupil tests it by the teacher's acceptance or 
rejection rather than by the facts that should be used to 
test it. 



434 The Principles of Education 

If the teacher merely tells facts without even presenting 
a problem to the pupil, he neglects giving intrinsic 
motivation and affording opportunity for the pupil to 
use the new truth presented. 

(3) When a pupil feels strong values and associates 
with them means for their realization or when he expe- 
riences problems and solves them, memory is a by-product 
of the process of learning. The best way to memorize a 
selection of literature, for example, is to read it with 
understanding and appreciation. 1 The best way to 
memorize control subject matter is through forming 
and solving problems. In view of this fact, the teacher 
need not make the pupil try to memorize. If the pupil 
tries to memorize, he is concerned with the difficulty of 
memorizing rather than with the difficulty of controlling 
some value for the sake of which the subject matter should 
be used. The attention upon memorizing, therefore, 
diverts attention from that which gives true value and 
meaning to what the pupil is learning. 

(4) A failure to understand the differences between 
purpose-giving subject matter and control-giving subject 
matter sometimes leads the teacher to apply the wrong 
method to the teaching of one or the other. The writer 
once heard an astronomy lecture in which the teacher, 
using the steps necessary to develop appreciations, 
presented the scientific material as though it were poetry. 
He aroused feelings of worth by calling attention to the 
immensity, harmony, and beauty of the universe, and 
then with this appreciated value associated God as the 
Author of it all. This led to the transfer of the feeling 
of value aroused to the idea of God. The class was left 
with a vague understanding suffused with emotion. The 

1 See Pyle, W. H., The Outlines of Educational Psychology, p. 193. 



The Methods of Teaching 435 

scientific subject matter, which was devised to give an 
understanding of the relations of the heavenly bodies, 
did not function properly in this class, because the proper 
method was not used. If the teacher desired to give a 
greater appreciation of the Author of the Universe, he 
should have taken for his lesson some work of literary art 
formed by a genius for this very purpose. He might 
have taken for his subject, " The heavens declare the 
glory of God ; and the firmament sheweth his handiwork," 
and used the Nineteenth Psalm as the subject matter for 
the lesson. Since this psalm was fashioned by a literary 
genius for the very purpose of giving a new appreciation 
of God, it would have given better results so far as the 
appreciation is concerned. A modern textbook on astron- 
omy is written from the scientific point of view as an 
instrument for giving knowledge rather than appre- 
ciation. The waste of energy when control subject matter 
is taught as purpose-giving subject matter is due to the 
fact that the subject matter is not used in the way it is 
fashioned to be used. 

At another time the writer heard a teacher of literature 
murder a literary selection by grammatical and rhetorical 
dissection. Instead of developing appreciations of value, 
she kept the attention of the class on scientific problems, 
thus teaching the purpose-giving subject matter as though 
it were control-giving subject matter. In assigning the 
advance lesson at the close of the recitation, the teacher, 
smiling with sweet confusion, said, " To-morrow, boys 
and girls, we shall take the life of Carlyle." They un- 
doubtedly did ! 

A work of literature is written to give its readers a 
new purpose; it is not written to give new control. 
When this teacher by the use of the wrong method 



436 The Principles of Education 

transformed the appreciation lesson into a control lesson, 
she not only deprived the pupils of the result which the 
work of literature was intended to secure, but also 
attempted to teach grammar and rhetoric by means of a 
selection which, not being intended for that purpose, 
did not effectively present this material. In the dis- 
cussion of the poem, grammatical and rhetorical facts were 
presented in a haphazard way and could not therefore be 
learned economically by the pupils. 

VIII 

Natural science, which explains teaching as controlling the en- 
vironment in such manner as to facilitate the making of nervous 
connections in the brain of the pupil, supports our conclusion that 
there are two general types of teaching, — that which guides the 
pupil in acquiring new purposes and that which guides him in 
acquiring new means of control. It supports also our conclusions 
with regard to the essential steps in each of these types of teaching 
and with regard to the use of extrinsic motivation, telling, the 
overemphasis of memory work, and the confusion of appreciation 
and control lessons as perversions of the methods of teaching. 

According to natural science, teaching is controlling the 
environment in such manner as to facilitate the making 
of nervous connections in the brain of the pupil. Teach- 
ing is necessary, because, on account of differences in the 
nervous organisms of the pupils, the textbooks and other 
forms of environment provided for by the curriculum do 
not always give all of the stimuli necessary to form the 
new brain connections. Wherever the environment pro- 
vided for by the curriculum does not give the stimuli 
necessary to make the appropriate changes in the nervous 
system of the pupil, the teacher should modify the environ- 
ment to the extent necessary to produce these changes. 

The main types of lessons from the point of view of 



The Methods of Teaching 437 

natural science correspond to the appreciation and the 
control lessons described above. One type of lesson is 
that which intimately connects brain paths already estab- 
lished with fundamental systems of reactions; the other 
is that which establishes new brain paths. In one case 
a new purpose is developed ; in the other, a new means 
of control. 1 

For teaching an appreciation lesson, the function of 
which, according to the materialistic point of view, is 
intimately to connect previously acquired brain paths 
with fundamental systems of reactions, natural science 
presents three steps, which correspond to the three steps 
into which the process has been analyzed from the teleo- 
logical point of view. 

(1) The environment must be modified in such manner 
that it will give the stimuli necessary to cause the funda- 
mental systems of reactions to function in the pupil's 
organism. These fundamental systems of reactions, such 
as those which form the physical parallels of aversion to 
suffering and death and of attraction to that which is 
loved, are usually strongly instinctive. If more than one 
system of reactions involving aversion begin to function 
through appropriate stimuli, the resulting tendency to 
aversion is strengthened ; if more than one system of 
reactions involving attraction begin to function, the 
resulting tendency to attraction is strengthened. The 
teacher may assist in calling forth each system separately 
and then let the organism unite them. This is the physical 
counterpart of the development of strong feelings of value 
through analysis and synthesis in teaching purpose- 
giving subject matter. In the case of the Twenty-Third 

1 For a detailed discussion of these processes, see pp. 92-98 and 121- 
127. 



438 The Principles of Education 

Psahn, for example, the fundamental responses to the 
stimuli of green pastures, still waters, protection against 
enemies, etc., may be called forth individually. If the 
responses in the case of the pupil are not as strong as they 
should be, the teacher must modify the environment so 
that the stimuli will call forth the appropriate strong 
responses. These various responses, after having been 
excited by appropriate stimuli, may be combined as a 
single reaction to the complex stimuli from the environ- 
ment. 

(2) The next step is to make the reaction channel of 
following the Lord, for example, an integral part of these 
open channels by connecting it with them. This is the 
physical counterpart of associating with the value pre- 
sented some means for its realization. 

(3) The environment must be modified so as to cause 
the reaction of following the Lord to function in connec- 
tion with the more fundamental reactions such as those 
towards green pastures, still waters, protection against 
enemies, and other stimuli presented by the psalm as a 
part of the environment. This is the physical counter- 
part of using the new means in realizing the appreciated 
value. 

In teaching a control lesson, (1) the first step on the 
mechanical side is to modify the environment so that 
stimuli will call forth a response and at the same time will 
check this response in its functioning. Appropriate stim- 
uli may call forth the reaction of reading ; but, if the read- 
ing is defective, the reactions of other organisms affected 
by the reading excite in the pupil responses which inter- 
fere with the reading. This step corresponds to the 
teleological step of developing a motive which involves 
the pupil in some difficulty. 



The Methods of Teaching 439 

(2) Reactions must now be directed towards the several 
parts of the situation until checked more specifically by 
the disturbing factor. This factor constitutes a part of 
the situation for which no adequate response has been 
acquired. The teacher may assist here by modifying the 
environment so as to give the stimuli necessary to make 
the pupil react to the specific obstruction. Such assist- 
ance may be afforded by giving stimuli which on other 
occasions have brought approximately the reaction needed. 
This tends to open a channel of response that is adapted 
to the situation. In the case of a reading lesson, the 
teacher may imitate the pupil's fault, thus opening a 
channel of response on the part of the pupil that will 
function in directing his reaction against the difficulty in 
his own reading. If the pupil, for example, reads in a 
monotone, the teacher, by himself reading in a monotone, 
may start in the pupil a reaction that will point to this 
fault. This step corresponds to the teleological step of 
denning the problem through hypotheses and testing the 
hypotheses in thought or in action. Incipient reactions 
appear on the side of consciousness as hypotheses. They 
are tested by action when they are fully carried out, and 
by thought when" they are measured only by the imme- 
diate effects they produce in the nervous system before 
overt response appears. 

(3) The response should then be turned towards over- 
coming the check. The teacher can do this by modifying 
the stimuli so as to open the channel to the response which 
will overcome the obstruction. In the study of gravi- 
tation, the pupil may be made to react as desired towards 
the stimuli of an apple falling to earth, if the teacher first 
opens the appropriate channel by having him react towards 
the stimuli of a piece of iron attracted by a magnet. This 



440 The Principles of Education 

step corresponds to solving the problem by hypothesis 
tested in thought or in action, or in both. The incipient 
reactions which have been directed to the point of diffi- 
culty are the counterparts of hypotheses and of the testing 
of hypotheses in the solving of a problem. The hypoth- 
esis is tested in thought, if it is tested by the immediate 
effects produced in the nervous system before an overt 
response appears. In testing the hypothesis, the teacher 
modifies the environment so as to give stimuli that will 
inhibit or strengthen the incipient reaction of the pupil 
at the point of obstruction. 

(4) The checked reaction must be completed through 
the new pathway of response developed by the situation. 
This corresponds to using the means of control in attain- 
ing the purpose. The teacher may assist here by removing 
obstructions that would present difficulties complicating 
the reaction unnecessarily, and thus enable the pupil to 
overcome one difficulty at a time. 

The evidence of natural science supports in a convincing 
way our conclusions with regard to extrinsic motivation, 
telling, undue emphasis upon memory work, and the con- 
fusion of appreciation and control lessons. 

In the terms of natural science, extrinsic motivation 
means the development of reactions in response to stimuli 
not normally producing these reactions. In the case of 
extrinsic interest in reading explained above, the pupil 
responded to the stimuli of the teacher's voice instead of 
to the stimuli of 'other human organisms that would in 
turn react favorably to his reading. Training under such 
abnormal situations fails to make the pupil responsive, in 
the absence of the teacher, to the situation that normally 
brings the response of reading. In the degree that the 
situation is abnormal, the response is abnormal; and in 



The Methods of Teaching 441 

the degree that the response is abnormal, the meaning 
which parallels it is perverted. 

Natural science shows that memorizing, which is the 
parallel of fixing reactions in the nervous system, should 
ordinarily be a by-product in education. It explains that 
reactions are fixed normally in the nervous system merely 
by being performed. To the extent that the individual 
does anything else than perform the reaction he is, of 
course, fixing the modified form of the reaction, which may 
be so different from the normal reaction as not to retain 
any of its essential characteristics. This is true when the 
organism reacts by reproducing symbols instead of by 
performing reactions for which these symbols stand. If 
the individual does not perform the reactions for which 
the symbols stand, he fails to acquire the true meanings of 
these symbols because the meaning of a thing symbolized 
parallels the reaction to it. 

In telling, the teacher undertakes to develop connec- 
tions in the nervous system of the pupil through the 
stimuli of words without direct evidence of just what 
guidance is needed for the development of the nervous 
system. If the pupil is stimulated to begin the reaction 
necessary to make the new connections which he should 
acquire, the teacher can discover what guidance is neces- 
sary by noting where the process of acquiring the new con- 
nections breaks down. The pupil must have assistance 
to overcome these difficulties, but he needs no other 
assistance than this. When, by the stimuli of words, the 
teacher undertakes to guide the development of nerve 
connections without knowing the breaks in the pupil's 
process of acquiring new connections, he is liable to omit 
important directions which the pupil should have. If 
these directions are omitted, the pupil does not acquire 



442 The Principles of Education 

the proper nerve connections and consequently does not 
get the proper appreciations and meanings. 

According to natural science, the teacher who confuses 
appreciation with control subject matter uses environ- 
mental conditions provided by the curriculum in an abnor- 
mal way and therefore does not get the satisfactory results 
that can be secured when they are used normally. 1 His- 
tory and the fine arts are effective guides for modifying 
the pupil's nervous system in such manner that particular 
responses are connected with fundamental systems of 
reactions ; but, if the teacher uses this subject matter to 
develop new reactions, the results are unsatisfactory, 
because the subject matter is not fashioned as a guide 
for developing new reactions. On the other hand, the 
sciences are effective guides for modifying the pupil's 
nervous system in such a manner that new reactions are 
acquired ; but if this subject matter is used by the teacher 
to connect responses with fundamental systems of reac- 
tions, he uses it as a means of doing that for which it is 
not well adapted. The teacher obviously gets better 
results by using the subject matter to do that for which 
it is especially adapted. 

REFERENCES 

Moore, E. C, What is Education? 1915, pp. 195-257. (Discusses 
the place of method in education and also learning by problem 
getting.) 

Dewey, J., Democracy and Education, 1916, pp. 193-211. (Presents 
the essentials of method. Valuable especially for advanced 

students.) 

Charters, W. W., Methods of Teaching, 1912. (Gives a clear 
explanation of methods of teaching from the functional stand- 
point. See table of contents for the topics discussed.) 

1 Cf. pp. 195-196. 



The Methods of Teaching 443 

Strayer, G. D., A Brief Course in the Teaching Process, 1911. (Dif- 
ferentiates various types of lessons and discusses separately 
each type. See table of contents for the topics discussed.) 

Fairchild, A. H. R., The Teaching of Poetry in the High School, 
1914, pp. 22-69. (Gives a revised and edited transcription of a 
stenographic record of the teaching of Browning's poem Andrea 
del Sarto to a class of high school pupils. The other chapters 
in this book also are stimulating and enlightening.) 

Hayward, F. H., The Lesson in Appreciation, 1915. (Gives valuable 
information regarding the teaching of appreciation of literature, 
music, and art.) 

Spencer, H., Education, Ch. III. (Gives an utilitarian discussion of 
moral education.) 

PROBLEMS 

1. Is it desirable that an elementary school teacher know the 
home life of her pupils? Why? 

2. Make a lesson plan for teaching some particular lesson in 
history. 

3. a. What in your judgment are the most common defects in 
Sunday school teaching? b. What suggestions would you make for 
overcoming these defects? 

4. Why is it important that a teacher enjoy a poem or other work 
of art he is teaching to a class ? 

5. If a teacher believes that appreciation is an end in itself and 
not related to action, what is the most serious error he is liable to 
make in teaching poetry? 

6. Should the teacher tell the class directly the moral of a story? 
Explain. 

7. Make a lesson plan for the teaching of some poem and indicate 
in the plan the essential steps in the teaching of purpose-giving 
subject matter. 

8. Make a lesson plan for the teaching of some picture and indi- 
cate in the plan the essential steps in the teaching of purpose-giving 
subject matter. 

9. A teacher required his pupils to commit to memory the more 
important rules for punctuation and then dictated to them a number 



444 The Principles of Education 

of sentences to be punctuated in accordance with these rules. Criti- 
cize his method of teaching. 

10. What should be the relation between classroom work and 
laboratory work in the teaching of some physical or biological science ? 

11. What is probably the main defect in the teaching of control 
subject matter, if the pupils seldom ask questions? 

12. What fault would you find in a lesson assignment that indi- 
cates merely what pages the pupil should read in the textbook? 

13. In assigning collateral reading, is it better for the teacher to 
ask the pupil to make an outline of what he reads or to report the 
important ideas in the reading that are new to him ? Explain. 

14. Would it be advisable for a teacher in assigning a review 
lesson of miscellaneous problems in arithmetic to tell the pupils the 
rule involved in the solution of each of the problems? Explain. 

15. How would you develop in children the ability to think for 
themselves ? 

16. How would you answer the objection that, in view of the 
amount of work to be covered in a course, it would take too much 
time to give the pupil a motive for each lesson, and to lead him to 
make and test hypotheses in defining and solving his problems? 

17. Mention some high school subject you have studied with 
intrinsic interest predominating and some high school subject you 
have studied with extrinsic interest predominating. Which subject 
did you the more good? Why? 

18. What are the relative values of competition and cooperation 
as motives for study ? 

19. a. What is meant -by socializing classroom instruction? b. 
How could the methods in some school with which you are acquainted 
be more fully socialized? 

20. Make a lesson plan for the teaching of some scientific truth 
and indicate in the plan the essential steps in the teaching of control 
subject matter. 

21. Explain the function of the subject matter you are preparing 
to teach and state the methods you should use to make it function 
normally in the experience of the pupils. 

22. Select a chapter from some textbook in science and tell what 
is the problem of the chapter and what is the problem of each section 
and paragraph. 



The Methods of Teaching 445 

23. a. How did you study Chapter XII in this book? b. Criti- 
cize your method of study in the light of Chapter XIII. 

24. In what particulars do you believe that you can improve 
your methods of study ? 

25. What evidence can you give that you are able to study more 
independently now than you were two years ago ? 

26. Do you believe that the students who rank highest in daily 
work in a high school or college course should be excused from ex- 
aminations ? Give reasons for your answer. 

27. Compare the analysis of the learning process given in this 
chapter with the analysis of study given in How to Study and Teaching 
How to Study, by F. M. McMurry, pp. 15-23. 

28. Why is the lecture method not suited to high school pupils? 

29. How should the methods of teaching in a secondary school 
differ from those adapted to university students ? 

30. How should the methods of teaching in an elementary school 
differ from those adapted to high school pupils ? - 



CHAPTER XIV 
EDUCATIONAL DEVELOPMENT 

The problem of this chapter is to find the general nature of 
the development of education as a rationalized endeavor. In 
the rationalization of education, the following subjects have 
arisen: History of Education, School Administration, Super- 
vision of Instruction, School Hygiene, Theory of Teaching, 
Educational Psychology, Principles of Education, and Philos- 
ophy of Education. The function of each of these subjects and 
the relation of each to the other fields of educational investiga- 
tion should be definitely recognized. The progress of education 
is as unending as human development. 

I 

The problem of this chapter is to find the general nature of the 
development of education as a rationalized endeavor. This de- 
velopment has resulted primarily from efforts to overcome through 
education difficulties in the social order. The development of 
education, like that of other forms of institutional activity, has 
been irregular. 

Educational activities, like all other social processes, 
develop through becoming rationalized. Difficulties in 
educational procedure are ever being discovered and 
overcome by careful thought. For the most part this 
thinking has been based upon mere opinion; but, with 
the application of scientific methods to the study of 
education, an accurate knowledge of the facts concerned 
has greatly increased the accuracy of the results attained 
in. the solution of educational problems. A detailed 
statement of the development of education as a rational- 

446 



Educational Development 447 

ized endeavor would constitute the history of education, 
which deals with the new educational purposes that 
have arisen from time to time and with the changes in 
practice that have been made in the service of these 
purposes. Our problem from the standpoint of the prin- 
ciples of education is to find the general nature of this 
development rather than the concrete details which com- 
prise it. Since the educational process is essentially the 
same whether it appears in the school or in other institu- 
tions, where it is of secondary importance, our study of 
the development of education through rationalization 
may be limited to the work of the school, with which most 
of the study of education has concerned itself. 

Men have, for the most part, defined the ideals and the 
methods of education when they have undertaken to use 
it for the sake of overcoming difficulties in the social order. 
When, for example, deep-set difficulties in the social order 
led to the problem of how a man should live in order to 
get the most out of life, Plato defined the educational ideal 
as knowledge, and gave an outline of the curriculum and 
the method which he believed would lead to the realiza- 
tion of this ideal. In answer to the conflict between indi- 
vidual interests and traditional social restrictions, Rous- 
seau explained the ideal of education as individual 
development, and presented a scheme whereby he be- 
lieved this ideal could be attained. When a difficulty 
arose because the practical demands of rapidly developing 
science conflicted with the traditional humanistic cur- 
riculum, Herbert Spencer devised important educational 
doctrine in attempting to solve the problem of what 
knowledge is of most worth. When a body of educational 
doctrine arising from various sources had been generally 
accepted, conflicts arose within the theory of education 



448 The Principles of Education 

itself. In reconciling such conflicts between the doc- 
trines of interest and effort and. between theories regarding 
the child and the. curriculum, Professor Dewey made 
valuable contributions towards rationalizing education. 
In recent years much attention has been given to diffi- 
culties arising within the technique of education; and 
valuable results, due largely to the use of scientific 
methods in locating these difficulties and in devising 
means for overcoming them, have been attained. 

The development of education has been irregular. 
Like other forms of institutional activity, it has passed 
through periods of development gradual, arrested, and 
revolutionary. Illustrations of this fact are given in the 
chapter on social development. 1 

II 

In the rationalization of education, the History of Education 
prevents formalism and opens the way for scientific improvement of 
educational practices, School Administration solves the problems 
arising from the complex school organization, Supervision of In- 
struction presents the methods that should be used in improving 
and coordinating the teaching in the schools, School Hygiene 
deals with health problems peculiar to school conditions, the 
Theory of Teaching reveals the methods by which the learning 
process can be controlled, Educational Psychology presents from 
the educational point of view an objective scientific study of human 
nature, the Principles of Education afford general guidance in edu- 
cational thought and practice by revealing the fundamental 
ideas which should regulate educational procedure, and the Philos- 
ophy of Education unifies the whole field of educational endeavor. 

When, because of the growing complexity of educa- 
tional practice, those engaged in educational work felt 
the need of guidance, they sought the History of Educa- 
tion in order to profit by the experience of the past, in 
1 See pp. 290-305. 



Educational Development 449 

which many thinkers had dealt with educational problems. 
Since educational classics were directly concerned with 
solving important educational problems and were easily 
accessible, these writings occupied the most prominent 
place in the History of Education. The appearance of 
new difficulties, — for later situations are different from 
those that have gone before, — and the development of 
scientific methods of investigation, led later educational 
thinkers to attempt to solve educational problems by a 
direct study of the facts themselves instead of depending 
upon the experience of the past. As new scientific sub- 
ject matter dealing with educational practice was in this 
way worked out, the History of Education was not so 
much depended upon for guidance in educational control, 
because the greater value of the results of modern scientific 
investigations was easily recognized. A modern scientific 
treatment of the methods of teaching is a better guide for 
school practice than the theories of teaching advocated 
by Rousseau, Pestalozzi, and Herbart, or accounts of 
the methods used by old-time schoolmasters. A modern 
standard work on school administration is more useful 
as a guide in organizing schools than is Comenius's Great 
Didactic or accounts of school systems in past genera- 
tions. Having been relieved of the responsibility of 
giving scientific guidance, for which it is not well adapted, 
the History of Education is now free to do the peculiar 
work in which it excels all other studies of education, — 
the work of revealing the purposes which underlie educa- 
tional practices. It thus prevents formalism and opens 
the way for the scientific improvement of these practices. 1 
When the independent one-room school gave way to 
city, county, and state educational systems, the problems 
1 See discussion of the function of history, pp. 202-204. 



450 The Principles of Education 

of administration became correspondingly complex. The 
solutions of these problems formed the subject matter of 
the study of School Administration, which includes such 
problems as those connected with the educational activi- 
ties of national and state governments ; the management 
of city, county, and district school systems ; the manage- 
ment of evening and continuation schools ; the construc- 
tion of schoolhouses ; the selection of the course of study ; 
the provision of textbooks and school supplies; the su- 
pervision of instruction ; the education of subnormal and 
supernormal children; the regulation of attendance; 
the control of the morals of pupils ; the administration of 
vocational and physical education ; the grading and pro- 
motion of pupils; the financing of schools; and the 
preparing of school records and reports. 

The Supervision of Instruction, which has to do with 
improving and coordinating the teaching in the schools, 
was done in the early days by laymen, who had no special 
training for this work. When, as schools became more 
highly developed, persons trained in education were 
needed for this work, it was transferred from laymen to 
the administrative officers of the schools. In the larger 
school systems, the work of supervising the instruction 
has become so extensive that it is assigned to officers who 
are specialists in this field. It is further organized by 
the special supervision of the instruction in such subjects 
as music, drawing, penmanship, and manual arts by 
persons specially trained for this work. The importance 
of supervision of instruction as a subject of study is such 
that it may be considered not only as one of the sub- 
divisions of Educational Administration, but as a subject 
requiring special treatment coordinate with that of School 
Administration. 



Educational Development 451 

Some of the problems which come before the supervisor 
of instruction are how to articulate the kindergarten, the 
elementary, and the high schools ; how to organize eco- 
nomically the work for each grade of school; how by 
measuring results and otherwise, to determine the abili- 
ties of teachers, so that each teacher who is retained in 
the service can be assigned the work he is able to do most 
effectively; how to lead the teachers to secure social 
rather than individualistic motives on the part of the 
pupils; and how to lead them to develop the pupils' 
interest, initiative, and industry. 

Health problems arising from indoor life, the grouping 
of many children in one building, close application to 
books, the use of the smaller muscles in handwork, the 
unusual demand for inhibition, and other conditions 
peculiar to the school have led to the development of 
School Hygiene as important subject matter. 

When men began to look upon the work of education 
not merely as disciplining the child by replacing his fickle 
interests and illogical thinking with the serious interests 
and logical thinking of the adult, but as guiding the 
growth of the child's experience in his development from 
infancy to maturity, the problems that gave rise to the 
Theory of Teaching became manifest. When motivation 
was secured largely by reward and punishment, and 
when learning was largely a matter of rote memorizing, 
men did not recognize the important problems of teach- 
ing ; but when they began to understand that teaching 
is controlling the development of a very intricate child 
nature, they did recognize these teaching problems, which 
at once began to multiply. The Theory of Teaching now 
deals with both general and special methods, the one 
comprising the fundamental forms of procedure which 



452 The Principles of Education 

apply to all teaching and the other dealing with the 
application of these to special kinds of subject matter, 
such as history, language, mathematics, biology, and 
physics. In view of the fact that the methods of teach- 
ing are the forms in which the subject matter is presented 
and are therefore closely dependent upon the nature of 
the subject matter, the need for the study of special 
methods is important. The Theory of Teaching deals 
from the point of view of the teacher with such problems 
as the following: What is the function of teaching? 
What is the nature of subject matter? What is the 
difference between the logical and the psychological 
organization of subject matter? What is the function 
of the curriculum? What is the nature of the pupil the 
development of whom should be guided by the teacher? 
What use should the teacher make of the curriculum? 
What is the difference between the incidental and the 
systematic teaching of subject matter? What are the 
natures of the various kinds of lessons? How should 
lesson plans be made? How should motivation be 
secured? How should lessons be assigned? What are 
the best forms of questioning? How should the class be 
managed? How can the teacher give moral training? 
What are the influences of physical conditions upon the 
work of the pupils? How can the results of teaching be 
measured and tested ? How should the work of teachers 
be supervised ? In the case of special methods, the prob- 
lems of teaching arise from the application of such ques- 
tions as these to the teaching of particular kinds of 
subject matter. These problems have to do with the func- 
tions of history, language, biology, and of other particular 
subject matter to be taught ; the motives by which the 
pupil should be led to study the kind of subject matter 



Educational Development 453 

with which the special method is concerned ; the psycho- 
logical as compared with the logical arrangement of 
particular lessons ; etc. 

Hand in hand with the Theory of Teaching, Educational 
Psychology has developed. Educational thinkers have 
found that not mere sympathetic insight into child nature 
produced by the teacher's imagining himself in the pupil's 
place, but an objective, scientific study of child nature is 
the only basis on which reliable methods of teaching can 
be developed. When Herbart recognized this fact, he 
developed a psychology as the basis for his theory of 
teaching. He found it necessary to devise the funda- 
mental principles of psychology himself, because the only 
generally accepted psychological theory of his time was 
the Aristotelian, supporting the old idea of education as 
discipline and offering no satisfactory explanation of 
the way in which ideas are acquired. Since teaching is 
" causing the pupil to learn," the scientific analysis of 
the learning process is the first step in determining what 
should be the nature of the teaching process. Educational 
Psychology, which has kept pace with general experi- 
mental psychology in its development, reveals the bearing 
of the facts and principles of psychology upon the prob- 
lems of teaching, and uses psychological methods in 
solving a wide variety of educational problems. It pre- 
sents the educational implications of these facts and 
principles regarding such matters as instincts and habits, 
memory, attention, thinking, fatigue, the improvement 
of mental abilities by practice, and the influence of the 
improvement of one mental function upon other mental 
functions. It also furnishes a scientific technique for 
measuring abilities and establishing norms. 

With the rapid development of educational thought, 



454 The Principles of Education 

some general guide was needed to mark the essential 
nature of education so that this essential nature would 
not be lost sight of in a confusion of details. There was 
need of principles to serve as general standards in judging 
the truth or falsity of educational ideas and practices, to 
provide a general basis for organizing ideas of the details 
of education, and, by revealing the true objectives of 
educational procedure, to indicate the problems requiring 
solution. 1 To meet this need, the subject matter of the 
Principles of Education has been devised. 

The Principles of Education have for the most part 
been stated in the terminology of natural science and have 
therefore described the life process as the process of 
adjustment of the organism to the environment. In some 
books on this subject, the point of view of teleology and 
that of natural science have been used without being differ- 
entiated. This lack of differentiation is liable to lead to 
erroneous ideas resulting from a confusion of the personal 
subject with the organism and of the objective aspect of 
experience with the environment. The difference between 
the explanation of human life afforded by natural science 
and that afforded by teleology, and the danger of con- 
fusing these explanations, are presented in previous 
chapters of this book. 2 

Some of the important questions which various books 
on the Principles of Education have undertaken to answer 
are as follows : What are the educational implications of 
the theory of evolution? What is the nature of social 
development? What is the relation of the individual to 
society in the process of education? What is the aim 
of education? What agencies other than the school 
educate? What is the function of the school? What 
1 See pp. 1-5. 2 See pp. 6-13 and 65-66. 



Educational Development 455 

are the functions of elementary, of secondary, and of 
higher education? What is the nature of educational 
value? What are the educational values of the sciences 
and of the humanities? What is the difference between 
liberal and vocational education? What are the criteria 
for selecting the curriculum ? What are the psychological 
bases of teaching? What powers and capacities should 
be recognized in educational procedure? What are the 
conditions of individual development? To what extent 
does the improvement of one faculty through use affect 
the improvement of other faculties? How should the 
school be organized in order to realize most effectively 
the aim of education ? 

A number of conflicts of a very fundamental nature 
have arisen in the field of educational study. The 
Philosophy of Education is the court of final appeal in 
reconciling these conflicts, and accordingly tends to unify 
the whole field of education. The Philosophy of Educa- 
tion carries with it a general attitude towards all 
educational endeavor, because it deals with fundamental 
ideas, or plans of action, that are concerned with this 
activity. In general, the Philosophy of Education bears 
to the Principles of Education a relation similar to that 
which philosophy bears to a science. Its function is to 
make a systematic inquiry into the fundamental nature of 
the presuppositions upon which the Principles of Educa- 
tion are based. As MacVannel says : 

The aim of the philosophy of education may be variously stated : 
(a) to discover the place and significance of education in human 
experience ; (6) to furnish a systematic interpretation of the presup- 
positions and results of educational experience; (c) to furnish a 
progressive organization of the principles presupposed and ascer- 
tained by the sciences in their relation to educational experience; 



456 The Principles of Education 

(d) to trace the relations of education to the other activities of 
civilization ; (e) to determine the relation of the educational process 
to the process of reality ; (/) to become the theory of the nature and 
development of educational experience; (g) to become the system 
or organization of the principles of education. 1 

Some of the more important problems considered in 
the Philosophy of Education are as follows : What is the 
meaning of education ? Is a science of education possible ? 
What are the factors of the educational process? What 
important implications does the theory of evolution have 
for educational theory? What are the nature and the 
meaning of environment? What is the difference be- 
tween the physical and the social environment? What 
is the aim of education? What is the nature of educa- 
tional value? What is the relation of mind to body? 
What is the nature of experience? How does experience 
develop? What is the relation of knowledge to virtue? 
What is the relation of theory to practice? What is the 
nature of personality? What is the relation of the indi- 
vidual to society? What is the nature of human institu- 
tions? What is the relation of education to social prog- 
ress? What should be the essential characteristics of 
education in a democracy? What is the relation of sub- 
ject matter to method? What is the essential problem 
of the methods of teaching ? What are the relative values 
of interest and effort in learning? What is the essential 
problem of the curriculum ? 

The lists of questions here given as examples of the 
characteristic problems with which various divisions of 
the study of education are concerned appear not to be 
mutually exclusive, but to overlap. To a considerable 

1 MacVannel, J. A., Outline of a Course in the Philosophy of Educa- 
tion, p. 16. 



Educational Development 457 

extent this overlapping is only apparent, because similar 
questions, when considered from different points of view, 
involve different problems. It is true, however, that the 
various fields of educational study have not been clearly 
differentiated by investigators. 

Ill 

The progress of education requires further development of the 
History of Education, Educational Administration, Theory of 
Teaching, and the like. The function of each of these subjects 
. and the relation of each to other fields of educational investiga- 
tion should be definitely recognized. The progress of education 
is as unending as human development. 

Whatever general advance is made in education must 
be made as the result of further rationalization of the 
educational process. Such advance requires that edu- 
cators know more definitely what they are trying to do 
and devise better means for accomplishing these aims. 
In this process of rationalizing educational procedure, the 
History of Education reveals the purposes underlying 
educational practices ; Educational Administration deals 
with the many problems that arise from the complicated 
organization of educational forces ; Supervision of Instruc- 
tion presents the methods that should be used in improv- 
ing the work of the individual teachers and in securing 
more effective cooperation among the various teachers 
employed in the same school system; School Hygiene 
deals with health problems peculiar to the school; the 
Theory of Teaching shows how the learning process of 
the child should be directed; Educational Psychology 
finds the natural endowments of human beings in so far 
as these endowments may be used in education, analyzes 
the learning process, and employs the technique of natural 



458 The Principles of Education 

science with its exact measurements and mathematical 
methods to solve many other related educational prob- 
lems; the Principles of Education give general guidance 
in educational thought and practice by revealing the 
fundamental ideas which should regulate educational 
procedure ; the Philosophy of Education as the last court 
of appeal in solving conflicts in educational thought, 
unifies the whole field of educational endeavor. This 
list of subjects which rationalize educational practice is 
not intended to be exhaustive. It represents, however, 
the more important subdivisions of study in this field of 
human activity. 

Sometimes the educational subject matter here men- 
tioned is divided into cross sections, so that elementary, 
secondary, and higher education are studied separately. 
These cross sections do not conflict with the divisions of 
educational subject matter here given, because elemen- 
tary, secondary, and higher education each presents 
peculiar problems that may be studied from the point of 
view of history, administration, teaching, psychology, and 
the like. These cross sections are an advantage, because, 
by subdividing the field of education, they simplify and 
more clearly define its problems. 

At present the main classes of educational subject 
matter overlap to a considerable extent. Attention was 
called to this fact in the preceding section in the case of 
lists of questions given to indicate the present scopes of 
various divisions of the study of education. This fact is 
revealed, moreover, by a comparison of the contents of 
textbooks and of syllabi of courses dealing ostensibly with 
different fields of educational study. The overlapping is 
due to the failure of various investigators to recognize 
the limits of their respective fields, largely because these 



Educational Development 459 

fields are new and have been developed to a considerable 
extent independently of one another. 

Educational investigation should be more definitely 
organized. Each division of the field, such as the History 
of Education, Theory of Teaching, Educational Psychol- 
ogy, and the Principles of Education, should have a 
definitely recognized function in contributing to the 
rationalizing of educational procedure and a definitely 
recognized relation to the other special fields of educational 
investigation. The greatest economy and efficiency in 
educational investigation requires that each worker rec- 
ognize the purpose and limitations of his own special 
field and that he cooperate intelligently with other in- 
vestigators in different fields. 

The development of education is as unending as human 
development, of which we have found it to be one of the 
factors. The educational problems we have attempted 
to outline live on, but the particular formulations and 
solutions of these problems change as the study of the 
individual reveals more definitely his nature and as 
changing civilization sets new patterns to guide the 
progress of the human spirit. 

REFERENCES 

Ruediger, W. C, The Principles of Education, 1910, pp. 1-19. 
(Discusses the teacher's professional curriculum.) 

Horne, H. H., The Philosophy of Education, 1905, pp. 7-13. (De- 
fines briefly the kinds of subject matter dealing with education.) 

Strayer, G. D., A Brief Course in the Teaching Process, 1911, pp. 
247-255. (Discusses the measurement of results in education.) 



460 The Principles of Education 

PROBLEMS 

1. Make a list of the more important educational periodicals and 
state the special field of each in the discussion of educational problems. 

2. Make a list of the titles and authors of thirty books on educa- 
tion, including not less than two books representative of each of the 
eight special fields of educational study defined in this chapter, and 
state the special field to which each book is mainly devoted. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Angell, James R., Chapters from Modern Psychology, 1912. Long- 
mans, Green & Co. 

Angell, James R., Psychology, 1908. Henry Holt & Co. 

Bachman, Frank P., Principles of Elementary Education and Their 
Application, 1915. D. C. Heath. 

Bagley, W. C, Educational Values, 1911. The Macmillan Co. 

Bagley, W. C, The Educative Process, 1907. The Macmillan Co. 

Baldwin, James Mark, Mental Development in the Child and in the 
Race, 1906. The Macmillan Co. 

Baldwin, James Mark, Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental 
Development, 1906. The Macmillan Co. 

Betts, George H., Social Principles of Education, 1913. Charles 
Scribner's Sons. 

Bolton, Frederick E., Principles of Education, 1911. Charles 
Scribner's Sons. 

Butler, Nicholas Murray, The Meaning of Education, 1903. The 
Macmillan Co. 

Charters, W. W., Methods of Teaching, 1912. Row, Peterson & Co. 

Colvin, Stephen Sheldon, The Learning Process, 1911. The Mac- 
millan Co. 

Davidson, Thomas, Education as World Building, Educational 
Review, Vol. XX, pp. 325-345. 

Davidson, Thomas, The Education of the Greek People, 1900. 
D. Appleton & Co. 

Davidson, Thomas, Rousseau and Education According to Nature, 
1907. Charles Scribner's Sons. 

De Garmo, Charles, Esthetic Education, 1913. C. W. Bardeen. 

Dewey, John, The Child and the Curriculum, 1902. University of 
Chicago Press. 

461 



462 The Principles of Education 

Dewey, John, Democracy and Education, 1916. The Macmillan Co. 

Dewey, John, How We Think, 1910. D. C. Heath & Co. 

Dewey, John, Interest as Related to Will. Second supplement to 

Herbart Yearbook, 1895. University of Chicago Press. 
Dewey, John, Moral Principles in Education, 1909. Houghton 

Mifflin Co. 

Dewey, John, The School and Society, 1915. University of Chicago 

Press. 
Dewey, John, and Tufts, James H., Ethics, 1909. Henry Holt & 

> Co. 
Eliot, Charles W., Education for Efficiency, 1909. Houghton 

Mifflin Co. 
Ellwood, Charles A., Sociology in its Psychological Aspects, 1912. 

D. Appleton & Co. 
Fairchild, Arthur H. R., The Making of Poetry, 1912. G. P. 

Putnam's Sons. 
Fairchild, Arthur H. R., The Teaching of Poetry in the High School, 

1914. Houghton Mifflin Co. 
Fiske, John, The Meaning of Infancy, 1909. Houghton Mifflin Co. 
Gordon, Kate, Esthetics, 1909. Henry Holt & Co. 
Hanus, Paul H., Educational Aims and Educational Values, 1908. 

The Macmillan Co. 
Harris, William T., Psychologic Foundations of Education, 1898. 

D. Appleton & Co. 
Hayward, Frank Herbert, The Lesson in Appreciation, 1915. The 

Macmillan Co. 
Henderson, Ernest Norton, A Text-Book in the Principles of Educa- 
tion, 1910. The Macmillan Co. 
Horne, H. H., The Philosophy of Education, 1905. The Macmillan 

Co. 
Howerth, Ira Woods, The Art of Education, 1912. The Macmillan 

Co. 
James, William, The Principles of Psychology, 1904. Henry Holt 

& Co. 
James, William, Talks to Teachers on Psychology : and to Students on 

Some of Life's Ideals, 1899. Henry Holt & Co. 



Bibliography 463 

Judd, Charles Hubbard, Psychology of High-School Subjects, 1915. 
Ginn & Co. 

Klapper, Paul, Principles of Educational Practice, 1912. D. Apple- 
ton & Co. 

Mackenzie, John Stuart, An Introduction to Social Philosophy, 
1895. James Maclehose & Sons, Glasgow. 

MacVannel, John Angus, Outline of a Course in the Philosophy of 
Education, 1912. The Macmillan Co. 

Magnusson, P. M., Psychology as Applied to Education, 1913. Silver, 
Burdett and Company. 

Marmery, J. V., The Progress of Science, 1895. Chapman & Hall, 
Ld., London. 

McMurry, F. M., How to Study and Teaching How to Study, 1909. 
Houghton Mifflin Co. 

Miller, Irving E., The Psychology of Thinking, 1909. The Mac- 
millan Co. 

Moore, Ernest Carroll, What is Education? 1915. Ginn & Co. 

Munsterberg, Hugo, Psychology and Life, 1899. Houghton 
Mifflin & Co. 

Munsterberg, Hugo, Psychology and the Teacher, 1910. D. Apple- 
ton & Co. 

Parker, DeWitt Henry, The Principles of JEsthetics, 1920. Silver, 
Burdett and Company. 

Paulsen, Friedrich, A System of Ethics, Tr. by Frank Thilly, 
1906. Charles Scribner's Sons. 

Pearson, Karl, The Grammar of Science, Pt. I, 1911. Adam and 
Charles Black, London. 

Plato, The Republic, in The Dialogues of Plato, Tr. by B. Jowett, 
Vol. Ill, pp. 214-246, 1892. The Macmillan Co. 

Pyle, William Henry. The Outlines of Educational Psychology, 
1911. Warwick & York, Inc. 

Pyle, William Henry, The Science of Human Nature, 1917. Silver, 
Burdett and Company. 

Raymont, T., The Principles of Education, 1905. Longmans, Green 
&Co. 

Robinson, James H., The New History, 1912. The Macmillan Co. 



464 The Principles of Education 

Rousseau, Jean Jacques, The Social Contract, Ti\ by Henry J. 

Tozer, 1905. Charles Scribner's Sons. 
Ruediger, William C, The Principles of Education, 1910. Hough- 
ton, Mifflin Co. 
Santayana, George, The Life of Reason — Reason in Science, 1906. 

Charles Scribner's Sons. 
Scott, Colin A., Social Education, 1908. Ginn & Co. 
Seashore, Carl Emil, The Psychology of Musical Talent, 1919. 

Silver, Burdett and Company. 
Spencer, Herbert, Education: Intellectual, Moral and Physical, 

1890. Willard Small. 
Spencer, Herbert, Essays: Scientific, Political and Speculative, 

1892. D. Appleton & Co. 
Strayer, George Drayton, A Brief Course in the Teaching Process, 

1911. The Macmillan Co. 
Thomson, J. Arthur, Introduction to Science, 1911. Henry Holt & 

Co. 
Thorndike, Edward Lee, The Elements of Psychology, 1905. A. G. 

Seiler. 

Thorndike, Edward Lee, The Principles of Teaching, 1906. A. G. 
Seiler. 

Welton, J., The Logical Bases of Education, 1904. Macmillan & Co., 
Ld. 



INDEX 



Advertising, 77 

Aim of education, various statements 

of, discussed, 324 
Analogy, use of, 102, 113 
Architecture, 231 
Aristotle, 27, 60 
Art, see fine arts 
Athenians, 299 

Bagley, W. C, 115, 121 
Baldwin, J. M., 28, 44 
Book, method of studying, 428 
Browning, E. B., 148, 225 
Browning, R., 208, 221, 400 
Bryant, W. C, 225 
Burns, R., 226 

Cause, 245 ; final, 13 ; physical, or 
efficient, 6, 12, 149 

Character building, 143 

Church, function of, 282 

Cleon, 208, 221, 239, 400 

Comte, 267 

Culture, 328, 376, 384 

Curriculum, function of, 339 ; rela- 
tion to teaching, 342 ; making of, 
Ch. XII ; problems in making of, 
350, 380; finding details of, 352; 
testing accuracy of, 353, 382 ; when 
change is justifiable, 354 ; opinion 
and science in making of, 354 
analysis of social needs for, 355 
required and elective work, 360 
errors in making of, 367, 382 ; char- 
acteristics of well-made, 283, 372 

Davidson, T., 146, 147, 151, 207 
Development, larger factors in hu- 
man, Ch. II ; personal, Ch. VI ; 



social, Ch. X; educational, Ch. 

XIV 
Dewey, J., 324, 330, 342, 345, 351, 

359, 448 
Dewey, J., and Tufts, J. H., 86, 89 
Dickens, Charles, 218 
Duty, ideal of, 140 

Education, statements of aim of, dis- 
cussed, 324 ; problems of, must ever 
be solved anew, 343, 348 ; subject 
matter of, should be better or- 
ganized, 458; see also educational 
factor or process 
Educational development, Ch. XIV 
Educational factor or process in hu- 
man development, general nature 
of, 38, 41, 346 ; analysis of, Ch. XI 
Educational psychology, 453 
Effort, 137, 141, 153, 373, 383 
Electives in curriculum, 360, 375, 384 
Elements, scientific, 249 
End, see purposes 
Ethical point of view, 12 
Ethical theory, evidence of, 83 
Euripides, 224 

Examination lesson, 407, 411, 415, 
431 

Factors in human development, the 

larger, Ch. II 
Faculty psychology, 330 
Fairchild, A. H. R., 413 
Feeling, in relation to purpose, 60, 112 
Final cause, 13 
Fine arts, function of, 171, 179, 182, 

193 ; compared with history, 199 ; 

differences among, 201 ; perversion 

of, 237, 241 ; promote social de- 



465 



466 



Index 



velopment, 305, 311 ; methods of 
teaching, 397 

Fiske, J., 43 

Formal discipline, 136, 330, 368 

Formalism, 167 

Freedom, gained through social de- 
velopment, 306, 312 

Froebel, 292 

General science, 265 
Genius, nature of, 113 

Hamlet, 223, 240 
Hanus, P. H., 365, 375 
Harris, W. T., 369 

Hedonism, 84 

Herbart, 292 

History, nature and function of, 170, 
179, 182, 193, 198, 202, 238; dis- 
tinguished from fine arts, 199, 240 ; 
common faults of, 209 ; as comple- 
ment of sciences, 215; promotes 
social development, 305, 311; 
method of teaching, 391 

History of education, 448 

Hobhouse, 247 

Home, function of, 281 

Human development, larger factors 
in, Ch. II ; see also individual, 
social, and educational factors or 
processes 

Idea, compared with means of con- 
trol, 51 

Idealisms, sciences, 17, 272, 276 

Idealistic point of view, 12 

Ideals, how made, 71 ; authority of, 
80 ; relation to effort, 140 ; see also 
purposes 

Individual, social nature of, 27 ; 
variation of individuals, 31 ; see 
also individual factor or process 

Individual factor or process in human 
development, conflict with social, 
25; general nature of, 30, 41; 
neglect of by Plato, 32 ; analysis of, 
Ch. Ill; factors of, 51, 62 

Individualism, condition of, 297 

Industries, function of, 281 



Infancy, meaning of, 42 

Institutions, functions of, 280, 308 ; 
growth of, 284, 290; all educate, 
320, 346 ; educational influence of 
each should be rationalized, 337, 
347 ; how far each should educate, 
363 

Interest, nature of, 131, 152, 365; 
immediate and mediate, 131 ; in- 
trinsic and extrinsic, 133, 152 

Intuitionalism, 83, 89 

James, W., 113, 127, 140, 144, 154 

Laocoon Group, 228, 405 

Laws, scientific, 251 

Literature, function of , 171, 179, 193; 

nature of, 216, 239 ; methods of 

teaching, 397, 437; see also fine 

arts 
Logical vs. psychological organization 

of subject matter, 257, 276 
Longfellow, H. W., 225 

Mackenzie, J. S., 335 
Marmery, J. V., 262, 286 
Materialistic point of view, 6 
Meaning, 114, 117, 118, 119, 126 
Means, when not justified by end, 81 
Means of control, compared with idea, 
51 ; nature of, 58, 64 ; how made, 
Ch. V; steps in making of, 110, 
122 ; scientific method reveals 
how made, 111; reason predomi- 
nant in making of, 1 12 ; difficult 
steps in making of, 113; teaching 
of , 416 ; see also meaning 
Memorizing, 434, 441 
Methods of teaching, function of, 
340; principles underlying, Ch. 
XIII; types of, 389, 347; why 
knowledge of, useful, 390, 427, 436 ; 
history, 391 ; literature, 397, 437 ; 
control subject matter, 416, 438 ; 
sciences, 416 ; reading and spelling, 
418 ; perversions of, 432, 440 ; see 
also examination, review, and study 
lessons 
Monroe, P., 173 



Index 



467 



Moral sense theory, 83, 89 
Moral training 1 , need of, 323 
Motivation, 416, 432, 440 
Motive, see purpose 
Moving picture, 236 
Miinsterberg, H., 88, 152, 245 
Music, nature of, 234 ; teaching of, 
406 

Natural science, point of view of, 6, 13 
Nature poetry, 224 

Object and subject, not factors of in- 
dividual process, 52, 65 
Olympic Zeus, statue of, 227 
Opinion, relation to science, 354 
Overcrowded curriculum, 377, 385 

Painting, nature of, 230 ; teaching 
appreciation of, 404 

Pearson, K., 245, 253, 254, 270, 271 

Personal development, Ch. VI, 334 

Philosophy of education, 455 

Physical point of view, 6 

Plan of this book, 19 ; outline, 22 

Plato, 32, 304, 327, 369 

Poe, E. A., 217 

Poetry, see literature 

Principles of education, function of, 
1,454; source of faulty, 2 ; need of 
true, 3 ; problem of organizing, 5, 
14 ; method of organizing, 19 

Problem, method of defining and 
solving, 101 

Psychological vs. logical organization 
of subject matter, 257, 276 

Psychophysical parallelism, 9 

Purposes, nature of, 56, 64, 92 ; how 
made, Ch. IV ; steps in making of, 
72, 76, 95; original and derived, 
79, 96 ; evidence of ethical theory 
as to making of, 83 ; feeling pre- 
dominant in making of, 1 12 ; 
source of interest, 131 ; social 
patterns for, Ch. VIII 

Reading, teaching of, 418 
Reason, in relation to purpose and 
means of control, 59, 61, 112 



Religion, function of, 282 

Religious sanction, strengthens good 

purposes, 74 
Required work in curriculum, 360, 

375, 384 
Review lesson, 407, 411, 415, 430 
Robinson, J. H., 210, 214 
Rousseau, J. J., 25, 36 

Santayana, G., 246 

School, function of, 281, 321, 347; 
relation to other institutions, 321, 
347, 362 ; all activities of, should 
be educative, 337 ; scope of activi- 
ties of, 338 ; work of, needs greater 
rationalization, 339 ; problems of, 
must ever be solved anew, 343, 348 

School administration, 450 

School hygiene, 451 

Sciences, vs. idealism, 17, 272, 276; 
function of, 174, 182, 189, 194, 243 ; 
giving ideals incidental, 180, 195; 
as patterns for control, Ch. IX; 
nature of, 245, 273 ; laws of, 251, 
276 ; physical and dialectic, 254 ; 
as development of common knowl- 
edge, 261 ; pure and applied, 262 ; 
classification of, 266 ; do not reveal 
reality, '271, 276; promote social 
development, 305, 311 ; relation of 
opinion to, 354 ; methods of teach- 
ing, 416 

Scientific method, reveals steps in 
making means of control, 111 

Sculpture, nature of, 227; teaching 
appreciation of, 405 

Self-realization, see personal develop- 
ment 

Sensations, united by meaning, 118 

Sistine Madonna, 230 

Slave Ship, The, 230, 404 

Social contract theory, 26 

Social development, nature of, Ch. X ; 
meaning of, 286, 307 ; gradual, 290, 
309; arrested, 295, 309; revolu- 
tionary, 296, 311 ; promotes per- 
sonal freedom, 306, 312 

Social efficiency, as aim of education, 
324, 333, 334, 347, 355 



468 



Index 



Social factor or process in human de- 
velopment, 25, 36, 41 ; analysis of, 
Ch. VII 

Social guidance, 163 

Social patterns, two kinds of, 162, 193 

Society, regulation by, 25 ; social con- 
tract theory of, 26 ; see also social 
factor or process 

Socratic method of teaching, 426 

Spelling, teaching of, 420 

Spencer, H., 84, 183, 185, 252, 261, 
268, 299, 357 

State, function of, 282 

Study lesson, 407, 412, 415, 428 

Subject and object, not factors of 
individual process, 52, 65 

Subject matter, two kinds, 162, 193 ; 
how related to methods of teaching, 
342 ; nature of unit of, 366 ; in- 
adequate guide for making curric- 
ulum, 368 

Supervision of instruction, 450 

Teaching, function of, 389, 436; see 
also methods of teaching and theory 
of teaching 

Teleology, point of view of, 12 



Tennyson, Alfred, Lord, 224 
Theory of knowledge, Kant's, 54 ; 

Locke's, 54 
Theory of teaching, improvement of, 

illustrated, 292 ; function of, 451 
Things, as bearers of purposes and 

meanings, 119, 127, 146; see also 

means of control and meaning 
Thomson, J. A., 264 
Thorndike, E. L., 96, 126 
Tradition, origin and nature of, 167 
Twenty-Third Psalm, 108, 219, 399, 

402, 437 

Utilitarianism, 83 

Value, see purpose 

Vices, how attitude towards develops, 

75 
Vocational education, 332 

Welton, J., 247 

Word, definition of, 115; nature of, 
116, 166 

World, as record of personal develop- 
ment, 147 

World building, 146, 155 



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